5 Things to do after installing Ubuntu 18.04

I’ve been playing around with various Linux distros for sometime now and each time I do a clean wipe of my partitions and install a new OS, I go through the same routine of adjusting its settings or acclimating the environment to suit my needs.

So here’s…

5 Things to do after installing Ubuntu 18.04

1. Settings

Click on activities on the top left corner and search for ‘Settings’. The dialog box that opens has an array of features that can be tweaked. First though, I set up my Wifi.

Next, I adjust the icon size on the Dock, 35-40 hits the sweet spot! Not too big not too small. FYI the Dock is the icon tray on the left (by default – although you can align it to another edge as well).

Ubuntu automatically sets the appropriate local language according to time zone and input you selecting during installation. I’m from South Asia, so, although I selected English as my language, some system text such as time are shown in my native language.

Power management depends on your needs and the amount of work you do on your computer. I usually set the system to suspend if I’m away from the computer for 10mins.

Night Light

Under Settings, click on Devices and select Display; there is an option to turn on Nigh Light feature. Once on, it adds a warm hue to your screen and reduces the cold blue light emitted. This reduces eye strain. Very helpful on those all nighters.

 

 

After getting the little things out of the way, it’s time focus on software…

2. Enable repos

After a fresh install of Ubuntu 18.04, if you try to install anything, you’ll probably get the following:

$ sudo apt-get install <package>
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree      
Reading state information... Done
E: Unable to locate package <package>

 
This is because, for some weird reason, the repositories may have got disabled. Open Software and Updates (you can search for this from Dash). Make sure that the four repositories are selected s shown below.

Then issue sudo apt-get update to update your source list.

3. Media Codecs

A fresh install of Ubuntu has limited video playback capabilities. In order to play media files like MKV, MPEG4, AVI etc, you’ll need to install media codecs. Ubuntu has them in their repository but doesn’t install it by default because of copyright issues in various countries.

Install these by:

apt install ubuntu-restricted-extras

4. Install Gnome-tweak-tool

Renamed as GNOME Tweaks, this is a nifty little piece of software that lets you control an array of features from Startup applications to cursor options on the Desktop.

5. Other Software

Now that our repositories are set up, you can go about installing your applications. It depends on what you use your computer for. Here are a list of my go to apps on ubuntu software center:

VLC – Media player.

Gimp – A photoshop alternative for Linux. I used to use Pinta to do small edits and enhancements on photos but seems as if the development has stalled because they haven’t released anything since 2015. Shotwell, which is included by default on Ubuntu 18.04 also has image enhancing features.

Visual Studio Code – developed by Microsoft, this editor has made great progress in short time and is now my de facto code editor.