Run updates
sudo apt-get purge command-not-found*
Thin out startup items
Re-enable full list
mkdir -p ~/.config/autostart
cd ~/.config/autostart
cp /etc/xdg/autostart/*.desktop .
sed -i "s/NoDisplay=true/NoDisplay=false/g" *.desktop
then upper right => Startup applications
disable zeitigist (logs user activity)
Thin out services
http://www.hecticgeek.com/2012/06/few-things-to-speed-up-ubuntu/
sudo apt-get install bum
gksudo bum
Disable bug reporting
/etc/default/apport
enabled=0
sudo service apport stop
Remove file backup tool
sudo apt-get autoremove deja-dup
Optional: remove zeitigeist entirely
sudo apt-get autoremove zeitgeist-core
not sure if good idea
Optional: clear package cache
sudo apt-get clean
(installation downloads a lot of used once packages)
Download gedit 2.28.4
http://ftp.gnome.org/pub/GNOME/sources/gedit/2.28/gedit-2.28.4.tar.bz2
It has nicer search/replace behavior
Desktop
Install gnome-session-fallback
Logout of current user
Select session gnome classic (no effects and login)
Uninstall unity if desirable
Install gnome-do
Uninstall Ubuntu One
Quit the Ubuntu One client
rm -rf ~/.local/share/ubuntuone ~/.cache/ubuntuone ~/.config/ubuntuone
sudo apt-get purge ubuntuone-client* python-ubuntuone-storage*
Uninstall Ubuntu Software Center
sudo apt-get purge software-center
No mystery meat scrollbar
12.04: gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface ubuntu-overlay-scrollbars false
you need to log out and back in to take effect
14.04: gsettings set com.canonical.desktop.interface scrollbar-mode normal
Disable unused services
Optional: install 32 bit compatibility
Install dev tools
sudo apt-get install gcc gcc-g++ make
sudo apt-get install kernel-devel
sudo apt-get install python-pip ipython
Oracle Java
Misc
sudo apt-get purge rhythmbox*
sudo apt-get purge empathy
# With MIDI
sudo apt-get install vlc vlc-plugin-fluidsynth
svn 1.7 # Don't need to uninstall 1.6 first sudo echo ''>>/etc/apt/sources.list sudo echo 'deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/svn/ppa/ubuntu precise main'>>/etc/apt/sources.list sudo echo 'deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/svn/ppa/ubuntu precise main'>>/etc/apt/sources.list sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get install subversion More proper way might be something like sudo add-apt-repository ppa:user/ppa-name
Non-production VM
sudo apt-get purge thunderbird*
Change password complexity requirement
/etc/pam.d/common-password
Original
password [success=1 default=ignore] pam_unix.so obscure sha512
To
password [success=1 default=ignore] pam_unix.so minlen=1 sha512
Chrome
I created a Search Engine named "No", gave it the keyword "null" and set the url to "http://%s". Then set it to be the default search engine. This effectively disables search.
Install TrueCrypt
VMWare
fix the desktop size at startup thing
WINE
Hugin
Gimp
Inkscape
Show seconds on clock
gsettings set com.canonical.indicator.datetime show-seconds true
Firefox disable remembering per site:
about:config browser.download.lastDir.savePerSite boolean w/ value false
.gitconfig
[user]
name = John McMaster
email = JohnDMcMaster@gmail.com
[color]
ui = false
[push]
default = simple
[pack]
packSizeLimit = 128m
threads = 4
windowMemory = 16m
eclipse startup
# for verilog stuff PATH=/opt/jdk1.7.0_60/bin:$PATH /usr/bin/eclipse
Overall evaluation
screen tab completion workaround
# Tab complete anything echo "complete -f -X '!*' screen">>~/.bashrc
Shorter nautilus mount path:
sudo ln -s /media/$USER /m
# gnome-open sudo apt-get install libgnome2-bin # usable desktop environment sudo apt-get install -y gnome-session-fallback # 32 bit libs sudo apt-get install gcc-multilib
Consider uninstalling anything special you did
sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get upgrade # sudo apt-get install update-manager-core # apt-cache policy update-manager-core sudo do-release upgrade
Outright bugs or anything that lessens productivity over 12.04
Had installed on personal desktop for a bit as a trial and didn't have any major issues. This machine gets light use and was to weed out any major issues. Similarly
screen tab completion: on 12.04 I could tab complete USB serial portrs. On 14.04 I can't even though I can open them. This looks to be some sort of tab completion permisson prediction failure (group vs other error?)
gedit:
cat>~/bin/gedit <<EOF /usr/bin/gedit "\$@" wmctrl -a gedit EOF chmod +x ~/bin/gedit sudo apt-get install -y wmctrl
gnome-disks (formerly palimpsest)
git
screen / tab completion on serial port
gthumb
sudo apt-get install -y itstool gsettings-desktop-schemas gsettings-desktop-schemas-dev libtiff4-dev wget https://download.gnome.org/sources/gthumb/3.2/gthumb-3.2.8.tar.xz tar -xf gthumb-3.2.8.tar.xz cd gthumb-3.2.8 ./configure make sudo make install
nautilus
Sleep, screen lock
screenshot: changed from automatic save to prompting. Need an option to auto save
W520 general notes
Evince 3.10.3:
sudo apt-get install -y libgail-3-dev libgnome-keyring-dev libnautilus-extension-dev libpoppler-glib-dev intltool gnome-doc-utils wget http://ftp.gnome.org/pub/GNOME/sources/evince/3.4/evince-3.4.0.tar.xz tar -xf evince-3.4.0.tar.xz cd evince-3.4.0 ./configure make sudo make install
Printer
Pidgin
Tested 12.04
sudo mount -o remount,rw /dev/sda1 /
Tested 12.04
If you use the palimpsest GUI it may create poorly aligned partitions. Instead, suggest you create the array by command line (hopefully this is fixed in later Ubuntus…)
format w/ good alignment
for dev in /dev/sd{h,i,j}; do
sgdisk -Z $dev
sgdisk -n 1:2048:5860533134 $dev
sgdisk -t 1:fd00 $dev
done
if md already
mdadm --zero-superblock /dev/sde
mdadm --zero-superblock /dev/sd{h,i,j}
deleted partions in palimpsest
create the array
mdadm --create /dev/md1 --level=5 --raid-devices=3 /dev/sd{h,i,j}1 --name=media5_3
add spare to media5_3 (broken sata connector…oops)
mdadm --manage /dev/md127 --add /dev/sdd1
For ubuntu 12.04 at least
sudo vim /etc/issue.net
sudo vim /etc/ssh/sshd_config
sudo vim /etc/pam.d/sshd
sudo /etc/init.d/ssh restart
Symptom: ssh slow
Cause: ssh client is attempting to do GSSAPI authentication. If you don't use this, consider disabling it to speed up handshaking
echo "GSSAPIAuthentication no">>~/.ssh/config chmod 600 ~/.ssh/config
Symptom: ssh -v shows hang after “debug1: SSH2_MSG_SERVICE_ACCEPT received”
Cause: sshd is attempting to reverse DNS the client. Often clients don't have reverse DNS making this process slow
Solution: disable this lookup. vim /etc/ssh/sshd_config
UseDNS no
echo "UseDNS no" |sudo tee -a /etc/ssh/sshd_config sudo /etc/init.d/ssh restart
ie from using sshfs, sftp in nautilus (gvfs), etc
I've found that 14.04 hangs my UI a lot more than 12.04 from broken SSH connections although I haven't really pinpointed exactly what causes this to happen. Experimenting with more aggressively closing broken connections
30 second timeout:
/etc/ssh/ssh_config
ServerAliveInterval 10 ServerAliveCountMax 3
adduser newuser
usermod -a -G adm,dialout,cdrom,sudo,dip,plugdev,lpadmin,sambashare newuser
usermod -a -G dialout
#!/usr/bin/env bash
if [ $UID -ne 0 ] ; then
echo "This script requires root privileges. sudo'ing..."
sudo $0 "$@"
exit $?
fi
echo "root stuff: $@"
echo “allow-guest=false” |sudo tee -a /usr/share/lightdm/lightdm.conf.d/50-ubuntu.con
Ubuntu 12.04: sudo apt-get install -y eclipse
Ubuntu 14.04: not all plugins I want are compatible with newer eclipse. Rolled back to known good version
Eclipse install URL:
| Plugin | Eclipse | Works? | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 4.4.0 | 3.7.2 | Yes | |
| 4.4.0 | 3.8.2 | No |
Installed into 3.7.2 (the normal menu method might have worked just fine) by
java.lang.UnsatisfiedLinkError: Could not load SWT library. Reasons:
Run: ln -s /usr/lib/jni/libswt-* ~/.swt/lib/linux/x86_64/
PyDev
http://pydev.org/manual_101_install.html
Launch eclipse
Help => Install new software
http://pydev.org/updates
check the regular (non-mylyn) build
uncheck contact for updates
hit install
http://sourceforge.net/projects/veditor/
Installed eclipse:
Stand alone eclipse:
| Plugin | Eclipse | Works? | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1.2.0 | 3.7.2 | Yes | |
| 1.2.1.b | 3.7.2 | Yes | |
| 1.2.1.b | 3.8.1 | No | |
| 1.2.1.b | 3.8.2 | Yes |
Default eclipse with Ubuntu:
non-root:
sudo apt-add-repository ppa:webupd8team/java sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get install oracle-java8-installer
Criticism
Performance troubleshooting:
Plugins:
sudo add-apt-repository http://ppa.launchpad.net/tualatrix/ppa/ubuntu sudo apt-get install ubuntu-tweak ubuntu-tweak
Increase tab contrast: http://askubuntu.com/questions/40332/how-to-make-selected-tab-in-terminal-more-prominent
White (default is light gray on very slightly different light gray):
cat>~/.config/gtk-3.0/gtk.css <<EOF
TerminalWindow .notebook tab:active {
background-color: #fffffF;
}
EOF
You must close and reopen gnome-terminal to take effect
mkdir -p ~/lib/python mkdir ~/bin cat>>~/.bashrc <<EOF export PATH=~/bin:$PATH export PYTHONPATH=$PYTHONPATH:~/lib/python EOF
Seems my W520 is a lot slower than my older t61p. I suspect it may just be on battery (solution: turn off power management) but want to run some benchmarks. Also possibly seen some contention issues w/ VMWare
Results:
Reasonably well working W520 configuration. I used to have the freeze problem but after some fiddling it went away. RAM upgrade?
$ lspci |grep VGA 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation 2nd Generation Core Processor Family Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 09) 01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation GF108GLM [Quadro 1000M] (rev a1) $ glxinfo |grep -i vendor server glx vendor string: NVIDIA Corporation client glx vendor string: NVIDIA Corporation OpenGL vendor string: NVIDIA Corporation
Bad configuration (random freezes):
$ lspci |grep VGA 00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation 2nd Generation Core Processor Family Integrated Graphics Controller (rev 09) 01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation GF108GLM [Quadro 1000M] (rev a1) $ glxinfo |grep -i vendor server glx vendor string: NVIDIA Corporation client glx vendor string: NVIDIA Corporation OpenGL vendor string: NVIDIA Corporation
I've had this occur a few times when I try to purge something. I don't know why network manager aggressively tries to uninstall itself. Fix is something like this (once you know your network parameters, ie from a computer DHCP'd on the same subnet)
ifconfig eth3 192.168.155.123 route add default gw 192.168.155.1 echo 'nameserver 10.1.2.3 ' >/etc/resolv.conf apt-get install -y ubuntu-minimal network-manager sudo start network-manager