[HOWTO] Cleaning Ubuntu for better performance and privacy

When I used Windows, I had come across several “system cleaners and optimizers”. One I liked was CCleaner (Crap Cleaner). It had a nice interface and was capable of cleaning cache and data of several applications.

I found a similar application for my Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx Alpha. It has similar interface and features. It is called bleachbit and can be installed via Synaptic (universe repos need to be enabled) and can be accessed from Applications>System Tools>Bleachbit. It is also capable of wiping the data so that it is impossible(or lets say difficult) to recover. It can also clean backup files (those hidden with ~ at the end of the filename, .bak, .tmp and more) with Deep Scan.

[SOLVED] Gtk-Message: Failed to load module “gnomenu-panel”

I am using globalmenu 0.7.9 (Mac OS X like Global menu for Gnome) from the globalmenu-team PPA (Karmic as Lucid is not available now) in my Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx. I get the following error on terminal when I try to launch any gtk applications from the terminal:

Gtk-Message: Failed to load module "gnomenu-panel": libgnomenu-panel.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
Gtk-Message: Failed to load module "globalmenu-gnome": libglobalmenu-gnome.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory


However, the gnomemenu-panel works fine, I wanted these messages to not appear.
I opened up /usr/lib/gtk-2.0/modules and found that the plugin had different files than listed in the error message. To fix the problem, I just created symbolic links to the existing files. This is how I did it from the terminal:

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[SOLVED] ‘Murrine configuration option “scrollbar_color”, “gradients” is no longer supported and will be ignored.’

I am using balazan theme in Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx Alpha 4 from breathe ppa for Karmic Koala since Lucid PPA was not available when I started using Lucid. I saw this message when I launched gedit from terminal (gnome-terminal):

/usr/share/themes/balanzan/gtk-2.0/gtkrc:89: Murrine configuration option "scrollbar_color" is no longer supported and will be ignored.
/usr/share/themes/balanzan/gtk-2.0/gtkrc:93: Murrine configuration option "gradients" is no longer supported and will be ignored.


Seems like the theme I’m using has some depreciated configuration options after Murrine update. I opened the /usr/share/themes/balanzan/gtk-2.0/gtkrc file (as root) using the following command from Alt+F2

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[HOWTO] Add multiple rapidshare, megaupload downloads in a Queue in Ubuntu with Tucan Manager

My friend who recently switched to Ubuntu was looking for a rapidshare, megaupload file downloader where he can queue downloads and leave it to download. Actually I found an application that not only supports rapidshare and megaupload but lots of other file-sharing sites such as 4shared, badongo, depositfiles, easy-share, filefactory, gigasize, hotfile, mediafire, sendspace, uploading and zshare. The application is called Tucan Manager and is available from the universe repository in Lucid Lynx (I’m sure it is available in Karmic and older versions too). Moreover, it supports uploads to these sites too.

To install it, just launch synaptic (System> Administration> Synaptic Package Manager). Goto settings>repositories and make sure “Community maintained opensource software (universe)” is checked. Reload the software list by clicking on reload and wait till it is done. Search for tucan and mark it for installation. Install it by selecting apply and wait till it is installed.

Once it is installed, close synaptic and launch it from Applications>Internet>Tucan Manager (or Alt+F2>tucan) and click on Find on the preferences window. Get the updates and mark the services you wish to use. Close it and restart it again.

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[SOLVED] Key Repeat Stopped Working, Problem In Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx Alpha 2

I am using Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx Alpha 2 and when I updated today, when I held down a key, I did not get repeated keypresses as I would normally. I don’t know which update actually caused this, but it was due to some packages I upgraded recently (any ideas?).
I just went to Keyboard Preferences (System > Preferences > Keyboard) and checked “Key presses repeat when key is held down” but it still did not work, for some reason. Then, I just played around with the sliders (Delay and Speed) and it started working.
Finally, I typed in the Test Field and set the preferences to my taste.
I have written this just in case somebody does not figure this out themselves.
Hope this is helpful.

[SOLVED] Unable to get Exclusive Lock Problem While Launching Synaptic, /var/lib/dpkg/lock – open (11 Resource temporarily unavailable) Error

I am using Ubuntu 10.04 Lucid Lynx Alpha and I encountered this while installing ltsp-server. The package being configured was ldm-server.

I was installing an application and Synaptic Package Manager just froze forever while configuring a package. I had to shut it down using sudo killall synaptic. Then, when I tried to launch t again, it would come up with “Unable to get Exclusive Lock” message. When I tried apt-get from Terminal, I got /var/lib/dpkg/lock – open (11 Resource temporarily unavailable).

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[HOWTO] Make Docky 3-D Style in Ubuntu

Docky is a great dock for Linux and is based on Gnome-do.

Installation
If you haven’t already installed it, you can add the following repositories to your Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala or Lucid Lynx: “ppa:docky-core/ppa” in Synaptic Package Manager>Settings>Repositories then reload. Then you can simply install it from Synaptic.

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What’s new in Ubuntu 10.04 Ubuntu Lucid Lynx – Download Daily Build

Ubuntu 10.04 daily build is now available for download at the Ubuntu Website. Here you go:
http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/daily-live/current/
UPDATE: Beta 1 is available here

However, if you are using Karmic already, don’t expect anything changed soon. It is almost like Karmic at the time of this posting. Changes will start to appear later.
UPDATE Feb, 2010: Alpha 3 brings theme changes.
UPDATE: Beta 1 brings other signification changes.

Having said that, they have plans to bring about following changes with Lucid Lynx:

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