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Transform Your Ubuntu's Look

freesoftwaremagazine.com — This article will detail how to mold the Ubuntu Gnome desktop into anything you want it to be

Who dugg this? Made popular Aug 2, 2006

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  • thegenome, on 10/12/2007, -5/+22Ubuntu is really awesome...i am really glad of the publicity it is getting.
    I think it is a leg up for Linux and will make loads of windows users change OS.

    And a mirror will be great :D
  • designbydave, on 10/12/2007, -2/+18ok this is a Gnome guide, not Ubuntu. It applies to any distro running Gnome.
  • 0siris, on 10/12/2007, -10/+25i thought your listing of your stereotypical comments wes helpful in the advancement of discussion.
    Kudos (and a digg up) to you Boomerxl
  • NICU, on 10/12/2007, -6/+21Hey I just switched my desktop to wireless with a very obscure wireless card. I had Windows and it took a long time to find drivers and get the card to work. Just for fun I ran a Ubuntu (6.06) Live CD just to see if it would work and it actually worked. I was so impressed I set my PC up to dual boot Ubuntu and XP, I haven't used XP in weeks.

    If you're still on Windows just try a Ubuntu Live CD, if you like it there's a ton of instructions for dual booting, if you don't like it use the CD as a coaster. Can't hurt to try before burying all Ubuntu stories.
  • anjinash, on 10/12/2007, -0/+13"That's exactly the issue- 5/10 new topics on this site are ubuntu this, ubuntu that. Barely anybody but a few linux creeps use the damn thing anyways."


    Man, are you a troll or what? 5/10 articles here are about Ubuntu? I think not. There are more OSX related stories here than Ubuntu, and even then 5/10 is a gross exxageration. If it was just a handful of, as you put it "Linux creeps" that dug this stuff, then how come these stories keep getting mass dugg to the front page? That would suggest more than a "handful" to me.

    Just because you don't like an OS (that you admit you've never tried, hence have no true point of reference save for your predisposed notions of what Ubuntu/Linux is rather than the realities) doesn't make it kosher to disrupt these threads. Face it, you're here to pick a fight and for no other reason. This makes you a troll.

    "Okay. Some reasons ubuntu is better than windows: ___________"

    Personally, I don't think it's better than Windows, it's just different from Windows (and OSX). I think each OS has its pros and cons. But since you're going to be a dick about it:

    1) It's free. Windows is not. No brainer.

    2) It's opensource. If you can turn out some code and there's something you want to change in the OS, you can grab the sourcecode and implement your own changes and recompile. Try doing that with Windows.

    3) It's far more secure. You don't hear about any adware or spyware on Linux, and virii are extremely rare. Go online with an unpatched Windows box and you'll be compromised within minutes.

    4) It can revive old hardware. Try running XP on an old Pentium 1 box with 128MB of RAM. You can do it, but it will run like *****. With Ubuntu, load up a low level desktop enviornment like XFCE and watch that machine perform. Better yet, screw the DE and go with a commandline and turn that old hardware into a file server or a firewall, it'll work great if you configure it properly.

    5) It relies on open standards rather than proprietary ones, meaning that your data (ogg files, openoffice docs, etc..) will still be usable 20 years from now. If MS went out of business and MS Office ceased to exist, you're screwed if you have all of your data in those formats. This is why my own state of Massachusetts is shying away from MS Office and adopting open standard documents.

    6) Flexablity. If you know how, you can change just about any part of the OS that you want. Anything. WIth Windows you need all sorts of third party apps, most of them not free, and even then you're very limited in what you can change without totally FUBARing your Windows install.

    I'm sure others can add more to this list, but it is a start. Again I repeat that I'm not one of the zealots who thinks using Windows is akin to molesting children.. Windows has it's uses just as Linux does. That doesn't change the fact that you're coming off like an ignorant 13 year old troll spoling for a fight.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -7/+20huh? did a fresh install two days ago and i'm on digg right now at a wifi hot spot, just sort of pressed the power button and went into firefox.
    not functional?
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -5/+17you'd think the headline would have made you avoid this article, not read it and comment about it. strange
  • gommle, on 10/12/2007, -3/+12Compiz Themer anyone?
  • becominglumberg, on 10/12/2007, -4/+12This is a great guide, but I think its been covered enough. Plus, Ubuntu isnt that hard to make look really good using just www.gnome-look.org.
  • Ramble, on 10/12/2007, -5/+11It says transform Ubuntu becuase the default Ubuntu is fugly.
  • voldak, on 10/12/2007, -6/+12http://duggmirror.com/linux_unix/Transform_Your_Ubuntu_s_Look

    http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:http://www.freesoftwaremagazine.com/articles/change_ubuntu_look

    http://www.freesoftwaremagazine.com.nyud.net:8090/articles/change_ubuntu_look

    try those...i haven't tested :)
  • Zanneth, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8Yeah, gnome-look.org and kde-look.org usually have everything you'll ever need for customization.
  • ahawks, on 10/12/2007, -5/+10I run Ubuntu now as well, but having been involved in Linux (professionally and recreationally) for about 8 years, the constant gneralizing of Linux to Ubuntu is pretty annoying.

    This should say: Transforming your GNOME desktop. Yes, Ubuntu uses gnome. So does Fedora, and plenty others. There is absolutely nothing Ubuntu-specific about it.
  • xcheats, on 10/12/2007, -4/+9http://www.freesoftwaremagazine.com.nyud.net:8080/articles/change_ubuntu_look
  • hchaudh1, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6@ilyag

    WTF are you blathering about? I Can you try to be more coherent, or did the MS kool-aid run out today?
  • hchaudh1, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8I would add XGL/Compiz with gcompizthemer to that list.
  • xcheats, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7http://www.duggmirror.com
  • procdaddy, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7lol this site will never see the light of day again thanks to digg.
  • newslang, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4I don't think all those people who dugg boomerxl down understood what he/she was doing.
  • fustanella, on 10/12/2007, -4/+7Ubuntu was the only distro I found to recognise my Linksys "version 4" PCMCIA wireless card all by itself - but it ignores the PS/2 mouse port on my ThinkPad 600e. A net win, as I use a USB mouse anyway. :)
  • mDot, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I don't see Linux getting a "de facto" distro as being a bad thing. Linux zealots are a funny bunch... a ton will say they want wide Linux adoption, but when a distro makes strides towards that they scoff because its to easy to use.

    I don't care what OS I'm running, as long as when I press the power button I can be productive. I wish more people would take on a similar mentality.
  • mDot, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3I guess I'll start the "Link your bad ass Ubuntu desktop screenshots" thread here.

    Here's mine: http://ubuntuforums.org/gallery/showgallery.php?cat=500&ppuser=78615
    XGL and Compiz included.
  • mDot, on 10/12/2007, -4/+6No, nothing can help KDE users... not even Linus.
  • benplaut, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3Yet it obviously shows that the Arch description is KISS.

    Arch is kindof a logical next step for ubuntu users who want something bleeding edge and more receptive to building from source than debian (sid).

    They compliment each other nicely :)
  • alej744, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2@ jacobmp92

    He was being sarcastic. (I *hope*)
  • BSherrod, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2How did you get that Glass theme mDot and can you get if you don't use XGL+Compiz?
  • sandpaperback, on 10/12/2007, -1/+3I dugg it just because I didn't know about the Art Manager. Otherwise it was pretty awful.
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4I want it to be KDE can this article help me?




    :P
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4Yup, I came from slack, still am a slacker at heart although I don't run it on my primary machines anymore as I was looking for something with a bit more optimization on my base packages. :)
  • yada, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1gotta love all those ads on every single page. sheesh...

    1. take screenshots of (insert geek product here) and post an article using commonly available tips & howto's.
    2. add a gazillion ads, break up article in to many pages.
    3. post to digg, /., sw, etc..
    4. profit!

    wanna know how to do something in ubuntu, just go to the official forums and docs !
  • pbaehr, on 10/12/2007, -3/+4Awesome. I just know I couldn't change it the normal way. I guess I should have looked further. Thanks for the heads up!
  • makario, on 09/03/2009, -0/+1If you scrolled up, you'd see some mirrors.
  • mDot, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1XGL and Compiz support the transparent window borders. I just used the Compiz Themer to tint and color the borders to look like glass.

    I havn't been able to get it to work in GNOME sans XGL and Compiz, but XFCE's compositor has the ability to do transparent window borders.
  • neuropsychguy, on 10/12/2007, -2/+3I don't know why the Dell comment has the negative ratings. I have an E1505 and have to manually insert the drivers via ndiswrapper. I know that a lot of Wifi cards work out of the box with Ubuntu, but they do not all work right away.
  • uownedge, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I just setup ubuntu on an old machine at work to use as a temporary file server for some of the commonly used applications around the office. Figured it'd save me some time of swapping out CDs, and fighting with windows to get a network share to actually show up (since sometimes it works and sometimes it doesnt!).

    Anyway, my point is, I was quite surprised at how well the distro actually worked. My previous experiences with it had been mostly mediocre, but for the most part, everything worked, and worked well.

    The only issues I have had is that I can't seem to get SSH or VNC to allow incoming connections. But just to use it as a workstation (or in this case, a temporary server), those things really don't matter. It was a breeze (no pun inteded) to install samba and get a share setup, and the whole install process took all of 20 minute.

    Not bad at all. I'm impressed (and I'm normally very picky about my *nix). :)
  • Bonzodog, on 10/12/2007, -3/+4I think from now on in, the greater majority of comments referring to changing something in linux, will nearly always refer to Ubuntu, as it is by far and away the most popular distro in use, and seems to be almost a de-facto standard.

    I have run ubuntu myself, but having been a linux user at home for nearly 10 years, have gone back to Slackware.

  • PiOTREC, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1I like the way UBUNTU looks but, the only thing that i find to be hard to
    work with is Dual Screen Display :( Cannot ever get it to work!
  • jorgevargas, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1WTF! he is showing how to change the theme.... and you got this to the front page.
  • Xilon, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Hmm it still looks like *****. Don't get me wrong, I love GNOME and the way it functions but it's just ugly... and the panels never get skinned properly. It still has a long way to go... hopefully compiz will help in that department.
  • chieffy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1Actually their site got the digg effect two days in a row and a slashdot effect in the middle. Talk about a pounding.
  • NICU, on 10/12/2007, -3/+4Check the forums for XGL/Compiz configuration. Just be careful with XGL, you can't run 3D accelerated games through Wine without a lot of extra work.
    XGL how to's - https://wiki.ubuntu.com/XglHowto and https://help.ubuntu.com/community/CompositeManager/Xgl are good.
  • jacobmp92, on 10/12/2007, -7/+8No, Slourte, you don't get it. Ubuntu is Linux, but Linux is not Ubuntu.
  • deverill, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0It's probably "Yet Another Ubuntu Article" instead of "Customizing Gnome" because anyone low-tech enough to think this is gee-whiz, let's make an article about it material is probably using Ubuntu instead of the less friendly distros. I've been doing "this stuff" since Minix was just a book and I use Ubuntu. It's not a bad distro but it is becoming the de facto Linux representative, especially among new Linux users.
  • guidot, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0Site down. Welcome to digg.
  • MaxFrost, on 10/12/2007, -3/+3I can't get xgl/compiz to load properly...but at least I can still do things normally...

    something is messed up with one of my GLlibs
  • kynky, on 10/12/2007, -0/+0I run archlinux because I wanted a better understanding of Linux, and with their KISS attitude to configuring it (using the cli) made this really easy. A Linux distro, with the ability to keep it lean and tailored to my specific individual needs with fantastic performance.

    But, I'm leaning towards Ubuntu because I want to devote my time more to development in ruby, because Ubuntu is point n click (to me), things just work, great as a developer if Ubuntu becomes a standard, great desktop OS for fun and games, and for my developer needs, without the hassle of maintaining the distro in the process. Sure it wont be as tweaked as a well tweaked gentoo install, but the Ubuntu guys do a damn good job, enough for me with a well fast pc.

    And for the other comments, I understand people are from a wide range of technical ability, what might seem obvious for some, isn't for others, things get digged for reason, then digged down for another, at least its fairest way so far.
  • punterfpc, on 10/12/2007, -5/+5Or at least that's Canonical's goal...
  • inactive, on 10/12/2007, -8/+7I really couldn't have agreed more, this is so simple. And why do all the multi-linux guides get big flashy "UBUNTU" headlines? Please don't tell me the majority of digg readers use Ubuntu as their distro of choice, get real, go with Arch Linux.
  • xxNIRVANAxx, on 10/12/2007, -3/+2So true, too bad fanboys buried you. As an Kubuntu user (but definately not a fanboy) I'd have to say fanboys kill the spirit of the distro. Article is lame.
  • shaolinpunks, on 10/12/2007, -5/+4wish the page could load so i could learn how.
    oh well
    bookmarked for a later date.
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