It’s Episode Twenty of Season Eight of the Ubuntu Podcast! Mark Johnson, Laura Cowen, and Martin Wimpress are together with guest presenter Joe Ressington and speaking to your brain.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
In this week’s show:
- We discuss Google Cardboard.
- We go over your feedback.
- We have a GUI love, LauncherFolders sent in by Rich. T.
- We chat about all the podcasts Joe presents on: Linux Luddites, mintCast, and JoeRess podcast. We also chat about Windows 8.1, Garmin 220 sports watch, and the MATE 1.10 release.
That’s all for this week, please send your comments and suggestions to: [email protected]
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If there is a problem with copy/paste between ‘webapps’, why not just remove the webapps and use the browser instead?
Sure, you’d lose the wonderful “swipe to switch webpage” ability and you’d have to use the clunky tab management, but you should be able to copy/paste at will.
In this show you mention that you talked about password managers in a previous episode. I wanted to listen to that again but going through the show descriptions on the web page I couldn’t figure out which episode that was. Can someone point me to that, please?
Gooey Luuurve.
I just thought that I’d post my email to the team here:
Hi gang.
First of all, thanks for continuing to put out a great podcast, which I listen to religiously every week.
Unlike a lot of people, it seems; I have been using Ubuntu with Unity on my main desktop computer (as well as on an HTPC connected to my main TV) for years now, with no real complaints except for the inherent limitations of the Unity Launcher (sidebar). It gets very cluttered very quickly if, like me, you like to keep lots of shortcuts close at hand.
Today, I stumbled onto a neat method of introducing Android/IOS style “App Drawers” to the Launcher.
It’s called LauncherFolders (by Anton Sukhovatkin) and can be found at http://unity-folders.exceptionfound.com/ . To install this very useful tool, simply:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:asukhovatkin/unity-launcher-folders
If you live on the bleeding edge, then go into “Software & Updates -> Other Software” and change the distro name.
Then:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install unity-launcher-folders
Launch the application from the HUD (it has a bright yellow Tux icon) and then you can start adding some nice, tidy app drawers to your Launcher. Also, if you want to add some app drawers to the desktop, simply copy them from your ~/.local/share/applications folder and you’re in business!
Screenshot
Other interesting GUI thingies:
My-Weather-Indicator:
http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2014/10/install-weather-indicator-ubuntu-14-10
https://launchpad.net/my-weather-indicator
http://www.atareao.es/
http://www.atareao.es/tag/my-weather-indicator/
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:atareao/atareao
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install my-weather-indicator
LinConnect Android Notifier:
http://linuxluddites.com/shows/episode-32/
https://github.com/hauckwill/linconnect-server
wget –quiet https://raw.github.com/hauckwill/linconnect-server/master/LinConnectServer/install.sh; chmod +x install.sh; ./install.sh
Recent Notifications Panel Indicator:
http://ubuntuhandbook.org/index.php/2013/09/view-notification-history-ubuntu-1304/
https://launchpad.net/recent-notifications
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:jconti/recent-notifications
sudo apt-get update; sudo apt-get install indicator-notifications
Go to Software Sources and change distribution name if you have to.
(To ‘trusty’)
Check Launchpad page to make sure.
Telegram Desktop App:
http://www.webupd8.org/2015/01/install-official-telegram-desktop-app.html
http://atareao.es/
http://www.atareao.es/tag/telegram/
https://launchpad.net/~atareao/+archive/ubuntu/telegram
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:atareao/telegram
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install telegram
Tor Browser Launcher:
https://micahflee.com/torbrowser-launcher/
https://github.com/micahflee/torbrowser-launcher
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:micahflee/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install torbrowser-launcher
How To: µTorrent Server – Forum Post:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2253391
Unity Remote Control for an HTPC (tested and working on Vivid):
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2134297&p=12654836#post12654836
I have also attached a how-to for get_iplayer, just in case you’re interested. 🙂
Hope these are helpful.
Rich.
How To: get_iplayer Web PVR Manager 2.90.txt
http://www.infradead.org/get_iplayer/html/get_iplayer.html
https://launchpad.net/~jon-hedgerows/+archive/ubuntu/get-iplayer
https://github.com/dinkypumpkin/get_iplayer/wiki/ubuntu
To install:
sudo apt-add-repository ppa:jon-hedgerows/get-iplayer
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install get-iplayer
To test:
get-iplayer
get_iplayer_web_pvr
Browse to: http://127.0.0.1:1935/
How To Start get_iplayer Web PVR Manager as a Service:
Create an init script:
sudo vim /etc/init/get_iplayer_web_pvr.conf
#/etc/init/get_iplayer_web_pvr.conf
description “get_iplayer Web PVR Manager”
author “Rich.T.”
# Start the service after everything loaded
start on (local-filesystems and started dbus and stopped udevtrigger)
stop on runlevel [016]
# Automatically restart service
respawn
respawn limit 99 5
script
# Run get_iplayer_web_pvr
su richard -c “get_iplayer_web_pvr > /dev/null 2>&1”
end script
To test it:
Restart your computer and test it in your browser!
How To Create a Desktop / Unity Launcher Shortcut for Starting and Stopping get_iplayer Web PVR Manager:
If you are on a desktop PC and don’t want get_iplayer_web_pvr running as a background task, but instead
want to use it like a desktop application, follow these instructions:
(Note: (Double-)Click the icon once to start get_iplayer_web_pvr and a second time to shut it down.)
Firstly, create a folder for your files:
sudo mkdir /opt/get_iplayer_web_pvr/
Give your user permissions to the folder:
sudo chown richard:richard /opt/get_iplayer_web_pvr/
Navigate to the directory:
cd /opt/get_iplayer_web_pvr/
Next, download the icon called “getiplayer.jpg” to the folder “/opt/get_iplayer_web_pvr/”. This will give you both a pretty icon and a professional looking desktop notification.
wget http://www.infradead.org/get_iplayer/html/getiplayer.jpg
Now create a startup/notifier script for get_iplayer_web_pvr in the same folder:
vim /opt/get_iplayer_web_pvr/get_iplayer_web_pvr.sh
#!/bin/sh
if pidof -x get_iplayer_web_pvr > /dev/null 2>&1
then
zenity –question \
–no-wrap \
–title=”get_iplayer Web PVR Manager” \
–window-icon=”/opt/get_iplayer_web_pvr/getiplayer.jpg” \
–text=”Are you sure you want to shut down get_iplayer Web PVR Manager?\n\nPlease ensure that all tasks have completed before confirming.\n\nThank You. ☺”
case $? in
0) killall get_iplayer_web_pvr
while [ “$(pidof -x get_iplayer_web_pvr)” ]; do
sleep 1
done
killall notify-osd
notify-send -i /opt/get_iplayer_web_pvr/getiplayer.jpg ‘get_iplayer Web PVR Manager’ ‘Now Shut Down.’ &
exit 0
;;
1) exit 0
;;
esac
else
killall notify-osd
cd /home/richard/Get_iPlayer # This is essential if you want the files to go to the right folder.
notify-send -i /opt/get_iplayer_web_pvr/getiplayer.jpg ‘get_iplayer Web PVR Manager’ ‘Now Starting and Launching Browser.’ &
xterm -e get_iplayer_web_pvr -o /home/richard/Get_iPlayer > /dev/null 2>&1 &
while [ -z “$(pidof -x get_iplayer_web_pvr)” ]; do
sleep 1
done
xdg-open http://localhost:1935 &
exit 0
fi
killall notify-osd
notify-send -i /opt/get_iplayer_web_pvr/getiplayer.jpg ‘get_iplayer Web PVR Manager’ ‘Error’ &
exit 1
Make the script executable:
chmod a+x /opt/get_iplayer_web_pvr/get_iplayer_web_pvr.sh
Now create a .desktop file for the shortcut:
vim /home/richard/.local/share/applications/get_iplayer_web_pvr.desktop
[Desktop Entry]
Encoding=UTF-8
Version=1.0
Type=Application
Name=get_iPlayer Web PVR Manager
Icon=/opt/get_iplayer_web_pvr/getiplayer.jpg
Path=/opt/get_iplayer_web_pvr/
Exec=/opt/get_iplayer_web_pvr/get_iplayer_web_pvr.sh
StartupNotify=false
StartupWMClass=get_iplayer_web_pvr
OnlyShowIn=Unity;
X-UnityGenerated=true
Make the shortcut executable:
chmod a+x /home/richard/.local/share/applications/get_iplayer_web_pvr.desktop
Done! The shortcut should now be accessable through the Menu/HUD and pinnable to the Launcher.