Building the perfect Ubuntu!

[omgseth]

Fairly new to Ubuntu, and have noticed that a lot of the attraction ( aside from the community and the fact that it's free ) is the ability to really customize Ubuntu. Just installed it today and already I'm noticing an amount of control that you could only get from Windows if using third-party apps and registry hacks. But something crossed my mind. How to build the perfect Ubuntu! Fast, good looking, efficient, etc...

Thus, I've discovered my new little hobby. Any tips from anyone on getting the most out of Ubuntu? Making it better? ( Keep in mind, I just was finally able to play a DVD, so even small ideas are welcome! ).

[JECHO]

Fairly new to Ubuntu, and have noticed that a lot of the attraction ( aside from the community and the fact that it's free ) is the ability to really customize Ubuntu. Just installed it today and already I'm noticing an amount of control that you could only get from Windows if using third-party apps and registry hacks. But something crossed my mind. How to build the perfect Ubuntu! Fast, good looking, efficient, etc...

Thus, I've discovered my new little hobby. Any tips from anyone on getting the most out of Ubuntu? Making it better? ( Keep in mind, I just was finally able to play a DVD, so even small ideas are welcome! ).

find a nice theme :)

[chris4585]

When you see a piece of software on a website always check the repositories first, instead of looking for tutorials on how to install the app.

[omgseth]

Any good apps I should check out? I've seen the list... there's ALOT.

[Nevon]

Any good apps I should check out? I've seen the list... there's ALOT.

That depends on what kind of applications you're looking for.

[chris4585]

Some of the stuff on here might be in the repositories but this website points out good stuff to have, like ubuntu tweak.

http://www.getdeb.net/

Have you even tried setting up compiz yet?

[racerraul]

The perfect Ubuntu you say?

that would be an official Enlightenment Ubuntu Distro ;)

[mikewhatever]

How to build the perfect Ubuntu! Fast, good looking, efficient, etc...

Are you saying the current Ubuntu versions are slow, ugly and inefficient?

[MaxIBoy]

If you haven't already, give Compiz a try.

There are a lot of DEs, shells, and WMs you can use, from the default GNOME setup to XFCE4; from KDE4 to KDE3 (the two are very different) to Enlightenment to LXDE; there are pure WMs like Blackbox, Openbox, and Fluxbox, and there are also "tiling" WMs like Wmii and AwesomeWM. With all of these, you either love it or hate it, everyone's preferences are different.

There are also single applications, such as the AWN dock, that aren't a full desktop but add some feature to existing ones.


Also, gnome-look.com, kde-look.com, xfce-look.com, skinbase.org, deviant art, unixporn.com (no joke,) and many other websites exist wholly to provide themes, wallpapers, icons, system sounds, and other things like that.

[smartboyathome]

Check out XFCE (no, not Xubuntu the mammoth-sized offspring of XFCE, XFCE itself).

[Sealbhach]

The perfect Ubuntu is a bit of a holy grail, and it's always just over the horizon.

There's quite a few Ubuntu based distros out there - where people have taken Ubuntu as a starting point and done their own mods:

http://distrowatch.com/search.php?category=All&origin=All&basedon=Ubuntu&desktop=All&architecture=All&status=Active

There's a lot of them.


.

[rhcm123]

This is kinda related, but what packages do you all think should be included by default with ubuntu? I think that di (mounted filesysem info), linux-logo (guess), ssh, flash, NTFS support should all be included by default.

[Greg]

Check out XFCE (no, not Xubuntu the mammoth-sized offspring of XFCE, XFCE itself).

:)

To expand on this: tear off GNOME. Install XFCE. Go to gnome-look.com and grab a nice GTK2.0 theme. Enable XFCE compositing, or add Compiz. Grab PCManFM, it's a better file browser than Thunar. Grab an icon set- that's what makes a desktop look pretty. Download the following CLI programs for your enjoyment- zsh (and then run chsh and respond to the prompt /bin/zsh), htop, screen. Install a tiling window manager as well just for the fun of it. Try out lots of stuff, don't be afraid to experiment. Add a dock, or don't. Enjoy yourself.

[Bölvaður]

Ubuntu is well balanced for all ranges of computer and well optimized compared to other major heavy desktop distros.

If you are into speed there are other distros for it, like Gentoo and Arch with a tiling window manager. If you are into eye candy there is Sabayon.
If you are into all you possibly might need out of the box there is Mandrake. If you need slimdown distro where you have good control over the package you got installed get Arch or just set up Linux from scratch.
If you need distro to be easy to set up for a office environment there is OpenSuse and Ubuntu.
If you want a distro that always has the newest software, go for something that has rolling release like Arch. If you are into super stability stay away from rolling releashes and use stable version of Debian.


Most "tweaks" are bad for some people, like installing preload which is not recommanded for people that has less than a gig of ram.

You could make a distro specially tweaked for your computer but it wouldnt be for others, might be worse. If you are going to make your own distro make sure to note what type of hardware it is adviced to use.

[Bölvaður]

0. welcome to the community. ):P Make sure to visit gnome look and gnome art (websites) and install ccsm (compiz config settings manager or something) you can probably find it under Applications → Add/Remove, and System → Administrator → Synaptic or just
sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager


Fairly new to Ubuntu, and have noticed that a lot of the attraction ( aside from the community and the fact that it's free ) is the ability to really customize Ubuntu. Just installed it today and already I'm noticing an amount of control that you could only get from Windows if using third-party apps and registry hacks.

1. using linux is not free, we are a community making things better, which takes work...from all the community. we need more contributors of any sort... from tech support to money or code contributes, and our favorite, subversion/alfa/beta test and report bugs, make translations.... etc...

2. these are just configurations... you'll be surprised how much you really can change (tweak and recompile your kernel to your needs). Your capabilities and your free time is the limit.

[swoll1980]

ubuntu-tweak (http://www.getdeb.net/download/3976/0)is a good app to help with settings that can be hard to find on your own.