Install & Try out Ubuntu’s New Fonts in Ubuntu 22.04 | 20.04

The Ubuntu design team is working on new Ubuntu fonts and proposes to use as default in the upcoming Ubuntu 23.04.

For testing purpose, the team posted the .deb packages for the new fonts in this thread. User can try it out by installing in all current Ubuntu releases and report any issue in this page.

I’ve tried out the new fonts in Ubuntu 22.04 LTS. The text in system menu and application window becomes a bit thin and compact than before.

And, the document text in text editor looks enlarged, that I even doubted if the font size was changed mistakenly.

How to Install the New Fonts

First, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open a terminal window. When it opens, run single command to download the 2 font packages:

wget https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/fonts-ubuntu/0.862-0ubuntu2/+build/25677616/+files/fonts-ubuntu_0.862-0ubuntu2_all.deb https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/fonts-ubuntu/0.862-0ubuntu2/+build/25677616/+files/fonts-ubuntu-console_0.862-0ubuntu2_all.deb

Install wget via sudo apt install wget if it says command not found.

After downloaded the packages, use command to install them:

sudo dpkg -i fonts-ubuntu-console_0.862-0ubuntu2_all.deb fonts-ubuntu_0.862-0ubuntu2_all.deb

You can then remove the 2 packages in user home folder. And restart computer to apply changes after installation.

How to Restore original fonts

The stock fonts package version varies on different Ubuntu editions, so I would recommend to first install Synaptic package manager in Ubuntu Software.

Then, open “Synaptic” and do:

  1. Search and highlight “fonts-ubuntu” package.
  2. Go to menu “Package -> Force Version”.
  3. Select the old stock version from pop-up dialog, then click “Force Version” button.
  4. Finally, click “Apply”.
  5. Also, do the previous steps one by one for “fonts-ubuntu-console” package.

Also, restart computer to apply changes and done!

Why You Should Opt Out of Sharing Data With Your Mobile Provider

A new breach involving data from nine million AT&T customers is a fresh reminder that your mobile provider likely collects and shares a great deal of information about where you go and what you do with your mobile device — unless and until you affirmatively opt out of this data collection. Here’s a primer on why you might want to do that, and how.

Image: Shutterstock

Telecommunications giant AT&T disclosed this month that a breach at a marketing vendor exposed certain account information for nine million customers. AT&T said the data exposed did not include sensitive information, such as credit card or Social Security numbers, or account passwords, but was limited to “Customer Proprietary Network Information” (CPNI), such as the number of lines on an account.

Certain questions may be coming to mind right now, like “What the heck is CPNI?” And, ‘If it’s so ‘customer proprietary,’ why is AT&T sharing it with marketers?” Also maybe, “What can I do about it?” Read on for answers to all three questions.

AT&T’s disclosure said the information exposed included customer first name, wireless account number, wireless phone number and email address. In addition, a small percentage of customer records also exposed the rate plan name, past due amounts, monthly payment amounts and minutes used.

CPNI refers to customer-specific “metadata” about the account and account usage, and may include:

-Called phone numbers
-Time of calls
-Length of calls
-Cost and billing of calls
-Service features
-Premium services, such as directory call assistance

According to a succinct CPNI explainer at TechTarget, CPNI is private and protected information that cannot be used for advertising or marketing directly.

“An individual’s CPNI can be shared with other telecommunications providers for network operating reasons,” wrote TechTarget’s Gavin Wright. “So, when the individual first signs up for phone service, this information is automatically shared by the phone provider to partner companies.”

Is your mobile Internet usage covered by CPNI laws? That’s less clear, as the CPNI rules were established before mobile phones and wireless Internet access were common. TechTarget’s CPNI primer explains:

“Under current U.S. law, cellphone use is only protected as CPNI when it is being used as a telephone. During this time, the company is acting as a telecommunications provider requiring CPNI rules. Internet use, websites visited, search history or apps used are not protected CPNI because the company is acting as an information services provider not subject to these laws.”

Hence, the carriers can share and sell this data because they’re not explicitly prohibited from doing so. All three major carriers say they take steps to anonymize the customer data they share, but researchers have shown it is not terribly difficult to de-anonymize supposedly anonymous web-browsing data.

“Your phone, and consequently your mobile provider, know a lot about you,” wrote Jack Morse for Mashable. “The places you go, apps you use, and the websites you visit potentially reveal all kinds of private information — e.g. religious beliefs, health conditions, travel plans, income level, and specific tastes in pornography. This should bother you.”

Happily, all of the U.S. carriers are required to offer customers ways to opt out of having data about how they use their devices shared with marketers. Here’s a look at some of the carrier-specific practices and opt-out options.

AT&T

AT&T’s policy says it shares device or “ad ID”, combined with demographics including age range, gender, and ZIP code information with third parties which explicitly include advertisers, programmers, and networks, social media networks, analytics firms, ad networks and other similar companies that are involved in creating and delivering advertisements.

AT&T said the data exposed on 9 million customers was several years old, and mostly related to device upgrade eligibility. This may sound like the data went to just one of its partners who experienced a breach, but in all likelihood it also went to hundreds of AT&T’s partners.

AT&T’s CPNI opt-out page says it shares CPNI data with several of its affiliates, including WarnerMedia, DirecTV and Cricket Wireless. Until recently, AT&T also shared CPNI data with Xandr, whose privacy policy in turn explains that it shares data with hundreds of other advertising firms. Microsoft bought Xandr from AT&T last year.

T-MOBILE

According to the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), T-Mobile seems to be the only company out of the big three to extend to all customers the rights conferred by the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA).

EPIC says T-Mobile customer data sold to third parties uses another unique identifier called mobile advertising IDs or “MAIDs.” T-Mobile claims that MAIDs don’t directly identify consumers, but under the CCPA MAIDs are considered “personal information” that can be connected to IP addresses, mobile apps installed or used with the device, any video or content viewing information, and device activity and attributes.

T-Mobile customers can opt out by logging into their account and navigating to the profile page, then to “Privacy and Notifications.” From there, toggle off the options for “Use my data for analytics and reporting” and “Use my data to make ads more relevant to me.”

VERIZON

Verizon’s privacy policy says it does not sell information that personally identities customers (e.g., name, telephone number or email address), but it does allow third-party advertising companies to collect information about activity on Verizon websites and in Verizon apps, through MAIDs, pixels, web beacons and social network plugins.

According to Wired.com’s tutorial, Verizon users can opt out by logging into their Verizon account through a web browser or the My Verizon mobile app. From there, select the Account tab, then click Account Settings and Privacy Settings on the web. For the mobile app, click the gear icon in the upper right corner and then Manage Privacy Settings.

On the privacy preferences page, web users can choose “Don’t use” under the Custom Experience section. On the My Verizon app, toggle any green sliders to the left.

EPIC notes that all three major carriers say resetting the consumer’s device ID and/or clearing cookies in the browser will similarly reset any opt-out preferences (i.e., the customer will need to opt out again), and that blocking cookies by default may also block the opt-out cookie from being set.

T-Mobile says its opt out is device-specific and/or browser-specific. “In most cases, your opt-out choice will apply only to the specific device or browser on which it was made. You may need to separately opt out from your other devices and browsers.”

Both AT&T and Verizon offer opt-in programs that gather and share far more information, including device location, the phone numbers you call, and which sites you visit using your mobile and/or home Internet connection. AT&T calls this their Enhanced Relevant Advertising Program; Verizon’s is called Custom Experience Plus.

In 2021, multiple media outlets reported that some Verizon customers were being automatically enrolled in Custom Experience Plus — even after those customers had already opted out of the same program under its previous name — “Verizon Selects.”

If none of the above opt out options work for you, at a minimum you should be able to opt out of CPNI sharing by calling your carrier, or by visiting one of their stores.

THE CASE FOR OPTING OUT

Why should you opt out of sharing CPNI data? For starters, some of the nation’s largest wireless carriers don’t have a great track record in terms of protecting the sensitive information that you give them solely for the purposes of becoming a customer — let alone the information they collect about your use of their services after that point.

In January 2023, T-Mobile disclosed that someone stole data on 37 million customer accounts, including customer name, billing address, email, phone number, date of birth, T-Mobile account number and plan details. In August 2021, T-Mobile acknowledged that hackers made off with the names, dates of birth, Social Security numbers and driver’s license/ID information on more than 40 million current, former or prospective customers who applied for credit with the company.

Last summer, a cybercriminal began selling the names, email addresses, phone numbers, SSNs and dates of birth on 23 million Americans. An exhaustive analysis of the data strongly suggested it all belonged to customers of one AT&T company or another. AT&T stopped short of saying the data wasn’t theirs, but said the records did not appear to have come from its systems and may be tied to a previous data incident at another company.

However frequently the carriers may alert consumers about CPNI breaches, it’s probably nowhere near often enough. Currently, the carriers are required to report a consumer CPNI breach only in cases “when a person, without authorization or exceeding authorization, has intentionally gained access to, used or disclosed CPNI.”

But that definition of breach was crafted eons ago, back when the primary way CPNI was exposed was through “pretexting,” such when the phone company’s employees are tricked into giving away protected customer data.

In January, regulators at the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) proposed amending the definition of “breach” to include things like inadvertent disclosure — such as when companies expose CPNI data on a poorly-secured server in the cloud. The FCC is accepting public comments on the matter until March 24, 2023.

While it’s true that the leak of CPNI data does not involve sensitive information like Social Security or credit card numbers, one thing AT&T’s breach notice doesn’t mention is that CPNI data — such as balances and payments made — can be abused by fraudsters to make scam emails and text messages more believable when they’re trying to impersonate AT&T and phish AT&T customers.

The other problem with letting companies share or sell your CPNI data is that the wireless carriers can change their privacy policies at any time, and you are assumed to be okay with those changes as long as you keep using their services.

For example, location data from your wireless device is most definitely CPNI, and yet until very recently all of the major carriers sold their customers’ real-time location data to third party data brokers without customer consent.

What was their punishment? In 2020, the FCC proposed fines totaling $208 million against all of the major carriers for selling their customers’ real-time location data. If that sounds like a lot of money, consider that all of the major wireless providers reported tens of billions of dollars in revenue last year (e.g., Verizon’s consumer revenue alone was more than $100 billion last year).

If the United States had federal privacy laws that were at all consumer-friendly and relevant to today’s digital economy, this kind of data collection and sharing would always be opt-in by default. In such a world, the enormously profitable wireless industry would likely be forced to offer clear financial incentives to customers who choose to share this information.

But until that day arrives, understand that the carriers can change their data collection and sharing policies when it suits them. And regardless of whether you actually read any notices about changes to their privacy policies, you will have agreed to those changes as long as you continue using their service.

Scrcpy 2.0 is out! How to Install & Use this Android Remote Control App

The free open-source Android screen mirroring and remote control application, Scrcpy, released version 2.0 today!

The new release feature audio forwarding support! Meaning it’s not only mirroring your Android screen, but also sending the sound from Android to your PC speaker. The new feature supports Android 11 and higher. It’s enabled by default, though there’s --no-audio flag available to disable it.

Another big change in the release is that the device screen can now be encoded in H.265, or even AV1 if your device supports AV1 encoding.

The release also includes new --list-encoders option to list audio and video encoders available in the device, and --list-displays to list displays available on the device. For more about Scrcpy 2.0, see the official release note.

How to Install & Use Scrcpy in Ubuntu 22.04 to control your Android Phone Wirelessly or via USB cable

NOTE: This tutorial is tested and works in Ubuntu 22.04, though it should also work in all current Ubuntu releases.

Step 1. Prepare your Android device

To use the software, you need to first enable USB Debugging Mode in Android.

1. First, go to Settings in Android. Navigate to “About Phone”, and tap on “Build Number” several times (usually 7 times). It should prompt you something like “You are now in Developer Mode“.

TIP: there’s NO security issue or performance loss with developer mode enabled.

2. Then navigate to “Developer Options” in Settings menu or ‘Additional Settings’ sub-menu, and turn on the option for “USB Debugging“.

Step 2. Install adb

adb (Android Debug Bridge) package is also required for this software. Just press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal and run command to install it:

sudo apt install adb

Step 3. Install scrcpy

There are few ways to install scrcpy, choose either one that you prefer.

Option 1: .deb package from system repository

Scrcpy is available in Ubuntu system repository. It’s working good in my case, though a little bit old that lacks new features.

To install the package, open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command:

sudo apt install scrcpy

Option 2: Snap package in Ubuntu Software

The snap package in Ubuntu Software can be the easiest way to install the app, though it runs in sandbox.

The snap package at the moment is the last 1.25 version, though it will automatically update to v2.0 once maintainer updated the package.

Scrcpy Snap in Ubuntu Software

Option 3: Install Scrcpy from the source

If you can’t wait to use the latest release, open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run the command below one by one to install it from source:

  • First, run command to install dependency libraries:
    sudo apt install ffmpeg libsdl2-2.0-0 adb wget gcc git pkg-config meson ninja-build libsdl2-dev libavcodec-dev libavdevice-dev libavformat-dev libavutil-dev libswresample-dev libusb-1.0-0 libusb-1.0-0-dev
  • Then, clone the source code via command:
    git clone https://github.com/Genymobile/scrcpy
  • Finally, navigate to source folder and start the installer script:
    cd scrcpy && ./install_release.sh

    NOTE: After building process it may ask you to type user password for the permission to install files into system directories.

Step 4. Remote control your Android in Ubuntu

Now, connect your Android device into Ubuntu using USB cable. Then, click “Allow” in Android to confirm the “Allow USB Debugging” dialog.

1. First, open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and start adb in your favorite mode:

  • To remote access via USB cable, run command:
    adb usb
  • To remote access using wireless network, run commands:
    adb tcpip 7676
    adb connect 192.168.0.150:7676

    Here, change port number 7676 and the Android’s IP address accordingly! When done successfully, you can then remove the USB cable.

2. If the previous step goes well without any error! You can now start scrcpy:

  • Run scrcpy command in terminal if you installed from system repository.
  • Launch it from start menu (or ‘Activities’ overview) if installed from source. For debugging purpose, use scrcpy(console).

That’s all. Your android screen should appear in the Ubuntu desktop after launching scrcpy. Enjoy!

Uninstall scrcpy

To remove the adb package, open terminal and run command:

sudo apt remove --autoremove adb

To remove Scrcpy installed as .deb package, use command:

sudo apt remove --autoremove scrcpy

For the snap package, just use Ubuntu Software again to remove it.

And, for the package installed from source, navigate to the source folder again in terminal window and run command to uninstall it:

sudo ninja -Cbuild-auto uninstall

GIMP 2.10.34 is out! JPEG-XL Export & 3.0 Dev Backports [Ubuntu PPA]

GIMP image editor released a new update for the 2.10 series few days ago! Here are what’s new and how to install guide for Ubuntu Linux users.

GIMP 2.10.34 is a new stable release features a lot of bug-fixes and a few enhancements. The official announcement is NOT ready somehow at the moment, though it’s released in gitlab project age. And, the source code is available to download at FTP web page.

For macOS, the DBus is now fully disabled as it in some cases could even cause app freeze. Open With feature still work fine, but other features using dbus (such as opening files or running batch commands from a separate GIMP process) won’t work. As well, check for updates function in macOS now works again.

The release also has some backports from the 2.99.x development releases. The “Canvas Size” dialog has been redesigned to use more horizontal space. And, it has new Template selector in resize dialog.

For PDF with transparent area, there’s new “Fill transparent areas with white” option which enabled by default on file import. And export dialog has “Fill transparent areas with background color” option to decide whether use transparent background.

Other changes in GIMP 2.10.34 include:

  • Symmetry dockable contents is now shown, yet deactivated, when no images are opened
  • Color scale preferences are now remembered across sessions.
  • Import JPEG-XL metadata support.
  • Export JPEG-XL support, always in 8bit lossless.
  • New header with “visible” and “link” icons in item dockables
  • Clipping layers better supported when importing PSD files
  • Paths are now exported to PSD
  • New option “Show reduced images” when loading TIFF images
  • 16-bit per channel export for raw image data

How to Install GIMP 2.10.34 in Ubuntu Linux

Option 1: Flatpak

GIMP provides official Linux packages through universal Flatpak package, though it runs in sandbox environment.

Ubuntu user can press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal, and run the following 2 commands one by one to install it:

  1. Make sure the flatpak daemon installed by running command:
    sudo apt install flatpak

  2. Then, install GIMP as Flatpak via command:
    flatpak install https://dl.flathub.org/repo/appstream/org.gimp.GIMP.flatpakref

Once installed, start it either from app launcher or run flatpak run org.gimp.GIMP in terminal.

Option 2: Ubuntu PPA

For those prefer the classic .deb package format. I’ve uploaded the package into the unofficial PPA, with support for Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 22.10.

  1. First, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal. When it opens, run command to add PPA:
    sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/gimp
  2. Then either upgrade GIMP using Software Updater, or run command in terminal to install it:
    sudo apt install gimp libgegl-0.4-0

    For Linux mint, you may need to run sudo apt update to update package index first.

Uninstall GIMP:

For GIMP package installed as Flatpak, open terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and run command to remove it:

flatpak uninstall --delete-data org.gimp.GIMP

Also run flatpak uninstall --unused to clean useless runtime.

For .deb package from PPA, open terminal and run command:

sudo apt install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/gimp

The command above will remove PPA and downgrade the GIMP package into stock version in system repository.

For choice, you may remove the PPA instead by running command:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:ubuntuhandbook1/gimp

And remove the GIMP image editor via:

sudo apt remove --autoremove gimp libgegl-0.4-0

Try out GNOME’s New Window Focus Animation in Ubuntu 22.10/Fedora 37

Gnome, the default desktop environment in Ubuntu & Fedora Workstation, is going to replace the app menu with a new window animation, for indicating window focus.

Meaning it will remove the app menu for current window, in the top-bar beside ‘Activities’ button. Because, it’s always confusing users who are new to GNOME.

Gnome to remove app menu, instead using a window animation

Instead, when switching workspaces, closing a window, or pressing Super + Tab, it will perform a short animation on newly focused window. As the GIF below shows you, it’s a window animation that scales up the window and then scales back, indicating that the window is on focus.

The downside so far is that it’s missing the behavior to indicate the process of launching a large or slow application …

How to Install the new Window Animation

The new function is available so far as a Gnome Shell extension called “Focus Indicator“, for testing purpose in GNOME 43. Meaning users of Ubuntu 22.10, Fedora 37, Arch and Manjaro, etc., can try it out by following the steps below.

1. For Ubuntu 22.10, firstly search for and install Extension Manager from Ubuntu Software.

Install Extension Manager in Ubuntu 22.04+

2. Then open the tool, and navigate to ‘Browse’ tab to search and install ‘Focus Indicator’:

For other Linux, just use ON/OFF switch in this web page to install the extension.

Configure the Window Focus animation

After installed the extension, use either Extension Manager or Gnome Extensions app to open the configuration dialog. Then, you can set the scale up/down delay, animation duration, scale factor, and so forth.

OBS Studio 29.0 is Out! How to Install via PPA in Ubuntu 22.04 | 22.10

OBS Studio, the popular free and open-source video recording and live streaming software, announced a new major 29.0 today.

The new release came with great improvements for Windows users, including AMD AV1 Encoder for the RX7000 series GPUs, Intel AV1 Encoder for Arc GPUs, and Intel HEVC Encoder.

It also introduced native HEVC and ProRes encoders, including P010 and HDR and Desk View support for macOS.

Other changes OBS Studio 29.0 include:

  • Upward compressor filter
  • 3-band equalizer filter
  • Update channels for opting into receiving beta/release-candidate builds to Windows
  • Websockets 5.1.0
  • Add media key support in Linux
  • Encryption and authentication support for SRT and RIST outputs
  • Support for higher refresh rates in the Video Capture Device source on Windows
  • Apple VT Hardware encoder to the Auto Configuration Wizard

How to Install OBS Studio 29.0 in Ubuntu:

It provides official binary packages for Windows, macOS and Linux in its official website.

For Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 22.10, Linux Mint 21, and their based systems, there’s also an official PPA repository contains the latest packages.

1. Firstly, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open a terminal window. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:obsproject/obs-studio

Type user password (no asterisk feedback) when it asks and hit Enter to continue.

2. Then, either use Software Updater to upgrade the software package is an old version was installed on your system.

Or, use apt command to install/upgrade the software package:

sudo apt install obs-studio

NOTE: Linux Mint may need to run sudo apt update first to update package cache.

Once installed, search for and launch OBS Studio from ‘Activities’ overview or start menu depends on your desktop environment and enjoy!

Uninstall OBS Studio

To downgrade the software to the stock version that your system repository provides, run command:

sudo apt install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:obsproject/obs-studio

Or, either open Software & Updates and remove the PPA source line under ‘Other Software’ tab:

or run command in terminal to remove the PPA repository:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:obsproject/obs-studio

Also, remove the OBS Studio if you want by running command in terminal:

sudo apt remove --autoremove obs-studio

QQ for Linux 3.0 is out! Wine no longer Required for this Chinese Chat App

For Chinese users or those who have friends or business in China, native QQ app is finally working well in Linux by releasing the 3.0 version!

QQ is one of the top popular instant messaging apps in China. It has an official Linux client since 2019, which was however old, crash often, and not suitable for daily use.

By releasing 3.0, QQ for Linux finally got a modern UI powered by its QQNT framework. Similar to the Windows app, it has the user avatar and a few navigation buttons in far left pane, friends and group chats in center, and messages in right.

QQ for Linux 3.0

Except for voice and video chat, it includes the most common used features, such as emoji picker, Ctrl+Alt+A screen capture, send files/images, chat history, add, remove, and search friends, as well as most group chat functions.

As well, there’s light and dark mode support, and system tray indicator to toggle app UI and online status.

In short, if you rarely do voice/video chat, the new official QQ client for Linux is now really great for daily use! Though, it seems available in Chinese language only.

Download QQ for Linux 3.0

The app is available for both modern 64-bit PC and ARM devices. Just click the link below to go to its website:

Select x64 for modern PC/laptop or arm64 for mobile devices, deb for Debian/Ubuntu/Linux Mint, or rpm for Fedora, Rocky Linux, openSUSE, etc. And, just double-click on the package should open the installer in today’s Linux.

The universal AppImage package is also available for choice. Grab it, add executable permission (in file ‘Properties’ dialog), and finally click run the package will open the QQ chat app.

That’s all. Enjoy!

Kdenlive video editor 22.12 is out! PPA updated with Ubuntu 22.10 Support

KDE’s Kdenlive video editor released version 22.12 this Monday! See what’s new and how to install guide for Ubuntu 22.04 and Ubuntu 22.10.

The new release of the video editor overhauled the whole guide/marker system. The new ‘Guides’ dock is available to seek, search, sort and filter all marker and guide.

Kdenlive 22.12 also improved support for Glaxnimate integration. It now sends the content of the timeline to Glaxnimate (need version >= 0.5.1) which then shows it as background, which makes it much easier to create animations that play together with your videos.

Other changes in Kdenlive 22.12 include:

  • New ‘Remove All Spaces After Cursor‘ and ‘Remove All Clips After Cursor‘ options.
  • Hamburger menu (‘≡’ icon) in tool-bar when menu bar hidden.
  • More explanation text in tool-tip when pressing Shift.
  • Custom cache size limit.
  • Cleanup the software configuration page.
  • Initial Qt6 and KDE Frameworks 6 support.
  • New Pixabay Video provider
  • Add option to disable countdown on audio capturing.
  • Add Pipewire as SDL output
  • audio level visualization filter, audio spectrum filter, audio wave form filter

How to Install Kdenlive 22.12 via PPA in Ubuntu:

The official PPA has updated the packages for Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 22.10, and their based systems.

Add the PPA

To add the Ubuntu PPA, either press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard or search for and open terminal (konsole) from start menu.

When terminal opens, run command to add PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kdenlive/kdenlive-stable

Type user password (no asterisk feedback) when it asks and hit Enter to continue.

Install / Update Kdenlive

After adding PPA, user can either open Software Updater (or Update Manager) to update the software package from an installed version:

Or run the command below to install or update the video editor:

sudo apt install kdenlive

NOTE: Linux Mint user has to run sudo apt update first to manually refresh package cache

And, if you got overwriting files issue due to the old dependencies: libmlt-data and melt, run command to remove them and then re-run the apt command above:

sudo dpkg -r melt libmlt-data

Once installed, press Super (Windows logo key) to open ‘Activities’ overview or start menu, and search for and open Kdenlive.

Uninstall Kdenlive

To remove Kdenlive, either use your system package manager or run the command below in a terminal window:

sudo apt remove --autoremove kdenlive

And remove the Ubuntu PPA either by running command in terminal:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:kdenlive/kdenlive-stable

Or use “Software & Updates” utility to remove the source line under “Other Software” tab.

Inkscape 1.2.2 is out! OpenClipart import works in AppImage & Windows

The free open-source Inkscape vector graphics editor got a new maintenance release for the 1.2 series.

The is the second update for Inkscape 1.2, which finally makes OpenClipart import available for Windows and Linux user using AppImage. And, Color extensions works on patterns again.

For macOS, spellchecking finally works and undo/redo options are back in the menu. For Linux, the snap package is no longer possible to install with --classic option. Meaning the snap won’t be able to access data outside of user’s home directory.

Other changes in Inkscape 1.2.2 include:

  • no longer freezes when rotating objects with snapping activated under certain conditions
  • Dithering now disabled by default due to performance loss.
  • Several fixes to the DXF14 export
  • TIFF export now supports transparency
  • DPI attribute is preserved for JPG and TIFF raster export
  • Correct PNG file permission in Linux.
  • Measure tool now indicates correct positions and sizes for shapes

There are as well various other bug-fixes and improvements, see the release note for details.

How to Install Inkscape 1.2.2 in Ubuntu & other Linux

Inkscape website offers official Windows, macOS, Linux, and source tarball, available to download at the link below:

For Linux, it’s available to install via AppImage, Snap, and deb (through PPA), and Flatpak.

Option 1: Snap

Snap is an universal package that runs in sandbox. Ubuntu 20.04 and higher can simply search for and install Inkscape as Snap from Ubuntu Software:

Install inkscape as Snap from Ubuntu Software

Option 2: AppImage

AppImage is a portable package works in most Linux. No installation required, just grab the package (via link above), enable ‘Allow executing file as program‘ in file Properties dialog. Finally, click Run the package to launch the editor.

Option 3: Ubuntu PPA

For the native .deb package, it has an official stable PPA contains the latest package for Ubuntu 20.04, Ubuntu 22.04, and Ubuntu 22.10.  Not only for modern 64-bit OS, the PPA now also supports for arm64/armhf architecture types.

1. First, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open terminal. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:inkscape.dev/stable

Type user password (no asterisk feedback) when it asks and hit Enter to continue.

2. Then either install the image editor as native .deb package via:

sudo apt install inkscape

NOTE: Linux Mint user need to refresh package cache via sudo apt update first.

Or use ‘Software Updater’ to upgrade from an old version:

Option 4: Flatpak

Flatpak is another universal package format that runs in sandbox. Different to previous package formats, Inkscape as Flatpak is maintained by the open-source community.

Ubuntu 20.04 and higher and follow the steps below to install Inkscape as Flatpak package:

  • 1. First, open terminal and install Flatpak daemon via command:
    sudo apt install flatpak
  • 2. Then install Inkscape as Flatpak using command:
    flatpak install https://dl.flathub.org/repo/appstream/org.inkscape.Inkscape.flatpakref

Uninstall Inkscape:

Depends on which package you installed, choose from the methods below:

  • For Snap package, remove it from Ubuntu Software.
  • For AppImage, just remove the package file.
  • To remove the Inkscape PPA, open terminal and run command:
    sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:inkscape.dev/stable

    Also remove the editor if you want via command:

    sudo apt remove --autoremove inkscape
  • For the Flatpak package, use command:
    flatpak uninstall --delete-data org.inkscape.Inkscape

    And run flatpak uninstall –unused to remove useless runtime libraries.

qBittorrent 4.5.0 is out! How to Install in Ubuntu 22.04 | 22.10

qBittorrent got a new major release this weekend. Here’s the new features and how to install guide for Ubuntu 22.04 & Ubuntu 22.10.

qBittorrent 4.5.0 features new icon theme, new color theme, better startup time, and export torrent support. And, it now uses libtorrent 2.0.x in the default binary packages.

Other changes include:

  • Add ‘View’ menu option to show/hide filter sidebar.
  • Add Auto resize columns functionality
  • Allow to use Category paths in Manual mode
  • Allow to disable Automatic mode when default “temp” path changed
  • Add right click menu for status filters
  • Allow setting the number of maximum active checking torrents
  • Allow to set working set limit on non-Windows OS
  • Allow to use POSIX-compliant disk IO type
  • Add Filter files field in new torrent dialog
  • Add file name filter/blacklist
  • Add support for custom SMTP ports
  • Add ability to run external program on torrent added
  • Add infohash and download path columns
  • Allow to set torrent stop condition
  • Add a Moving status filter
  • Add a Use proxy for hostname lookup option
  • Introduce a change listen port cmd option
  • Implement Peer ID Client column for Peers tab
  • Add port forwarding option for embedded tracker

As well, there are various bug-fixes in the release. See more in the news page.

How to install qBittorrent 4.5.0 in Ubuntu 22.04 | 22.10

The software has an official Ubuntu PPA which however updates the latest package so far only for Ubuntu 22.04, Ubuntu 22.10, Linux Mint 21 and their based systems.

1. First, press Ctrl+Alt+T on keyboard to open a terminal window. When it opens, run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:qbittorrent-team/qbittorrent-stable

Type user password when it asks (no asterisk feedback) and hit Enter to continue.

2. Then, either run software updater (Update Manager) to update the bittorrent client if an old version was installed.

Or install it using command:

sudo apt install qbittorrent

For Linux Mint, either use Software Manager after refreshing package cache, or run sudo apt update before running the command above.

Uninstall/Restore:

Option 1: If you want to downgrade qBittorrent package to stock version in system repository, install ppa-purge tool and purge the PPA by running command in terminal:

sudo apt install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:qbittorrent-team/qbittorrent-stable

Option 2: Or, remove the client package either via Ubuntu Software or by running command:

sudo apt remove --autoremove qbittorrent

And, remove the PPA either via ‘Software & Updates‘ utility under ‘Other Software’ tab or by running command:

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:qbittorrent-team/qbittorrent-stable