I’ve had to set up a few Ubuntu desktop machines recently (for my own use), and I thought it was worth documenting what I install on each one, and how I automate those installations as much as possible.
Add a script to make updating software easier
Create a new file called updateall
#!/bin/bash
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get upgrade -y
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade -y
sudo apt-get clean -y
sudo apt-get autoclean -y
sudo apt-get autoremove -y
Move it to /usr/local/bin/ then make it executable with sudo chmod -X updateall.
Add some software from the Ubuntu repositories
sudo updateall
sudo apt-get install git gimp byobu vlc ubuntu-restricted-extras build-essential hexchat openssh-server unity-tweak-tool youtube-dl
Install Spotify
sudo apt-key adv --keyserver hkp://keyserver.ubuntu.com:80 --recv-keys BBEBDCB318AD50EC6865090613B00F1FD2C19886
echo deb http://repository.spotify.com stable non-free | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/spotify.list
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install spotify-client
Install atom
cd Downloads
wget https://github.com/atom/atom/releases/download/v1.7.3/atom-amd64.deb
sudo dpkg -i atom-amd64.deb
The version number may be different – get the latest version from https://github.com/atom/atom/releases/.
Install dropbox
wget https://www.dropbox.com/download?dl=packages/ubuntu/dropbox_2015.10.28_amd64.deb
sudo dpkg -i dropbox_2015.10.28_amd64.deb
The version number will be different, but hit tab after typing dropbox and it should autocomplete. If that doesn’t work, download the latest version from https://www.dropbox.com/install?os=lnx.
Install tails-installer
wget --continue http://dl.amnesia.boum.org/tails/stable/tails-i386-2.3/tails-i386-2.3.iso
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:tails-team/tails-installer
sudo apt update
sudo apt install tails-installer
Install pandoc
wget https://github.com/jgm/pandoc/releases/download/1.17.0.2/pandoc-1.17.0.2-1-amd64.deb
sudo dpkg -i pandoc-1.17.0.2-1-amd64.deb
sudo apt-get install texlive
See here for more on how I configure and use Pandoc, and also for a fix for a Mac OS X related bug to do with rendering PDFs.
Cosmetic tweaks
Go to System Settings --> Appearance
Change theme from Ambience –> Radiance
Reduce Launcher size to 24
Change desktop wallpaper
Enable workspaces
Open Unity Tweak Tool and configure so that hot corners work, with the top left and right corner doing a window spread (largely because that’s how my Macs are set up, and also how Gnome 3 works).
Go to System Settings --> Security and Privacy and turn off all “phone home” functionality.