Ubuntu / Linux news and application reviews.

Football Manager 2014 Released, Available For Linux

football manager steam

Football Manager 2014 has been released on Steam and, as it was announced a while back, is available for Linux:

Install Nemo With Unity Patches (And Without Cinnamon Dependencies) In Ubuntu

Update: for Nemo 3.x, available for Ubuntu 16.04 and 16.10, there's a new PPA. See THIS article for more info.

Nemo, the default Cinnamon file manager, needs Cinnamon to be installed, even if you want to use it in some other desktop environment such as GNOME/Unity. That's not the only issue that makes using the latest Nemo under Unity difficult - Cinnamon 2.0 breaks Unity in Ubuntu 13.10, Nemo no longer draws the desktop icons and so on.

Update: the PPA now provides Nemo 2.8.7 for Ubuntu 16.04, 15.10, 15.04 and 14.04.

nemo file manager ubuntu unity

I wanted to use the latest Nemo under Unity, but without Cinnamon dependencies so I used the Nautilus Unity patches modified for Nemo by Jacob Zimmermann, which I updated to work with the latest Nemo, and I also added some extra patches to remove the Cinnamon dependencies (except for cinnamon-translations but that shouldn't be an issue), re-enable Nemo to handle the desktop icons and allow Nemo to use GNOME Control Center / Unity Control Center to change the desktop background or set a picture as wallpaper via context menu.

Get The Ubuntu One Nautilus Integration Back In Ubuntu 13.10

In Ubuntu 13.10, there's no Nautilus integration for Ubuntu One because the package containing the Nautilus extension was removed.

Some of that functionality is integrated with the Sync Menu, but not all: currently, there is no way of knowing if a file is currently in sync with Ubuntu One. Also, some users might prefer to right click a file in Nautilus to share it / get a share link, instead of opening the main Ubuntu One interface. Read on to find out how to get this back in Ubuntu 13.10.

UbuntuOne Nautilus integration Ubuntu 13.10

Edit Samsung TV Channel List With SamToolBox

I recently needed a tool to edit a Samsung TV channel list and I've tried a few tools but all were pretty buggy. I ended up using an application called SamToolBox which, even though it is a bit buggy and not very intuitive, gets the job done.


SamToolBox is available for Linux and Windows and it should work with all Samsung TVs that support extracting the channel list.

GIMP 2.9 (2.10 Development Builds) Available In New Ubuntu PPA

Thorsten Stettin has created a new PPA for Ubuntu / Linux Mint users who want to use the latest GIMP 2.9 development builds.

There won't be a GIMP 2.9 stable release - 2.9 is used for development and will result in the next stable GIMP version, 2.10.

The major new feature in GIMP 2.10 will be a complete port to GEGL / high bit depths and the latest GIMP from GIT already allows working in 16bit and 32bit per color channel mode, both integer and float:

System-Wide PulseAudio Equalizer Updated For Ubuntu 16.10, 16.04 And 14.04, Linux Mint 18 And 17

I've uploaded the unofficial system-wide PulseAudio equalizer to main WebUpd8 PPA for Ubuntu 14.04 Trusty Tahr. 

Update: the equalizer was updated to support Ubuntu 16.10. The PPA now supports Ubuntu 16.10, 16.04, 15.10, 15.04, 14.04 and 12.04, as well as Linux Mint 18 and 17.

The package update comes with a fix for a crash that occurred when no presets were found. The issue that caused audio to be muted as soon as PulseAudio Equalizer was enabled, disabled, or adjusted, was also fixed.


Get The Sound Working In Skype With Ubuntu 13.10

Skype Linux

Ubuntu 13.10 (and derivatives) users: if you're using Skype downloaded from its official website and not from the Ubuntu repositories, chances are the sound in Skype is either distorted or there's no sound at all.

Sync And Collaboration Tool `Seafile` 2.0 Beta Brings New Desktop Syncing Client

Seafile is an open source cloud synchronization and collaboration tool which you can install on your own server. The tool uses a version control model somewhat similar to GIT but with some differences such as: automatic syncing, no history stored on the client side so the data is not stored twice (GIT is not efficient with large files), resumable transfers, more user-friendly file conflicts and more.

First Development Release Of Parole Media Player 0.6 Is Out, Install It In (X)Ubuntu

The first development release of Parole Media Player 0.6 (version 0.5.90) was released recently, bringing changes such as: improved GStreamer 1.0 support, completed the port to GTK3, a nice new overlay for the playback controls and more.

Parole Media Player

Y PPA Manager 0.9.9.1 Released With Ubuntu 13.10 Fixes

Today I've released Y PPA Mangager 0.9.9.1 which brings bug fixes for the latest Ubuntu 13.10 as well as some changes on how the tool works.

Y PPA Manager

For those not familiar with Y PPA Manager, this is a tool that lets you easily add, remove or purge PPAs as well as search for packages in Launchpad PPAs, a feature that should be very useful when you can't find a PPA for your favourite app on WebUpd8 or other similar websites. Other features include:

Xubuntu 13.10 Sound Indicator Fix

The Sound Indicator doesn't work by default in Xubuntu 13.10 but there is a quick work-around you can apply to get it to work.

Xubuntu 13.10 Sound Indicator fix

Ubuntu 14.04 Codename Revealed: Trusty Tahr

Trusty Tahr

Mark Shuttleworth has announced the codename for the next Ubuntu release (14.04 LTS): Trusty Tahr:

Pinguy OS 13.10 Alpha Released With GNOME 3.10

Pinguy OS 13.10 alpha, an Ubuntu remaster that ships with many popular applications and tweaks, is available for testing.

Pinguy OS 13.10 screenshots

8 Things To Do After Installing Ubuntu 13.10 (Saucy Salamander)

Ubuntu 13.10 was released today and for those of you who plan on doing a clean install, here are 8 useful things to do after the installation.

Ubuntu 13.10 Saucy Salamander

See What`s New In The 13.10 Release Of Kubuntu, Xubuntu, Lubuntu And Ubuntu GNOME

Kubuntu, Xubuntu, Lubuntu and Ubuntu GNOME reached version 13.10. Let's take a quick look at what's new!

Ubuntu 13.10 Available For Download


Ubuntu 13.10 was released today and while there aren't as many new features as in the previous releases, there are some interesting changes. Read on to see what's new in Ubuntu 13.10 (Saucy Salamander)!

Cross-Platform BitTorrent Client `qBittorrent` 3.1.0 Released With Support For Atom Feeds, Other New Features

qBittorrent is a cross-platform BitTorrent client that aims to provide a free software alternative to uTorrent. The application comes with an integrated search engine, web interface, sequential download support, bandwidth scheduler, advanced RSS support with download filters, torrent creation tool, IP filtering and other useful features.

qBittorrent screenshot

Fix Bumblebee libturbojpeg.so Issue In Ubuntu 13.10 Saucy Salamander

In Ubuntu 13.10 (Saucy Salamander), it seems that the libturbojpeg .so filename has changed from libturbojpeg.so to libturbojpeg.so.0 and this breaks Bumblebee. Below you'll find a quick fix for this issue.

VirtualBox 4.3 Released With Multi-Touch And Video Capturing Support, More

Oracle released VirtualBox 4.3 today with some exiting new features such a new virtual multi-touch USB interface to support touch-based operating systems, video capturing support and more.

VirtualBox 4.3 screenshot

Pipelight 0.2.0 Released With Multi-Plugin Support (Silverlight And Flash For Now)

Pipelight, a project that allows you to install Silverlight to any Linux browser that supports the Netscape Plugin API (Firefox, Chrome, Midori), has been updated today, receiving multi-plugin support.

Silverlight Firefox Linux

Clementine 1.2 Released (Amarok 1.4 Inspired Cross-Platform Music Player)

Almost a year after the previous major release, Clementine 1.2 is finally available for download with some interesting new features such as support for playing music from your Box, Dropbox and Ubuntu One account, a new Android app that lets you control Clementine remotely and more.

Clementine music player 1.2 screenshot

Install Rhythmbox 3.0 In Ubuntu 13.10 Or 13.04

Rhythmbox 3.0 was released more than a month ago, bringing an improved user interface, Python 3 support for the plugins and more. Unfortunately, the new version didn't make it into Ubuntu 13.10, but there's a PPA you can use to install it (also available for Ubuntu 13.04).

Rhythmbox 3.0

Cinnamon 2.0 Released, Becomes An `Entire Desktop Environment`

Cinnamon 2.0 has been released today featuring many bug fixes as well as some new features.

According to the release announcement, with version 2.0, Cinnamon is no longer a frontend ontop of the GNOME desktop like Unity or GNOME Shell, but "an entire desktop environment". Cinnamon is still built on GNOME technologies and uses GTK, but "it no longer requires GNOME itself to be installed" because it now communicates with its own backend services, libraries and daemons.

cinnamon 2.0

How To Disable Amazon / Shopping Suggestions And Other Unity Scopes In Ubuntu 14.04 Or 13.10

In Ubuntu 13.04, if you want to get online search results in Dash without shopping suggestions, you can simply remove the Unity Shopping lens. In Ubuntu 13.10 (Saucy Salamander) and 14.04 (Trusty Tahr) you can't remove the Shopping lens but there is another way to achieve the same thing and it seems this isn't obvious because I've seen quite a few users complaining about it. So here's how to disable the shopping scopes or any scope for that matter, in Ubuntu 13.10 or 14.04, without disabling all the online search results.

Update: this article was initially written for Ubuntu 13.10 but everything here was tested and it works with Ubuntu 14.04 too.

Unity Dash sopping suggestions
Unity Dash with shopping suggestion

Sync And Collaboration Tool `SparkleShare` 1.2 Released [Ubuntu PPA]

SparkleShare is an open source cloud collaboration/synchronization tool that uses Git under the hood and can be used with your own Git repository or with services such as BitBucket, GitHub, Gitorious and Plan.io.

sparkleshare

Xfwm4 4.11.0 Released With Sync to VBlank Support, Install It In Xubuntu

Xfwm4 4.11.0 has been uploaded recently to the Xfce 4.12 PPA for (X)Ubuntu 13.10, 13.04, 12.10 and 12.04, bringing Sync to VBlank support for the Xfwm4 (Xfce's window manager) compositor, which should prevent tearing when dragging/resizing windows, media players and flash applications, etc.

xfce sync to vblank

Ubuntu 14.04 LTS To Stay On GTK/GNOME 3.8?

Ubuntu GNOME

Sebastien Bacher, software engineer at Canonical, recently posted a message on the Ubuntu Desktop mailing list in which he proposes that Ubuntu stays on GTK/GNOME 3.8 for the next cycle (Ubuntu 14.04 LTS).

Ubuntu 13.10 Will Not Use XMir By Default

ubuntu saucy salamander

Canonical has decided not to switch to Xmir by default for Ubuntu 13.10 Saucy Salamander.