Things To Do After Installing Ubuntu 13.10

Ubuntu 13.10, codenamed Saucy Salamander has been released as per its schedule on 17th October. If you did not upgrade from Ubuntu 13.04 to Ubuntu 13.10 and instead you did a clean install of Ubuntu 13.10, you might be wondering what are the things to do after installing Ubuntu 13.10.

This is one of the first question that pops up after installing any new OS, what to do next? I have previously written on things to do after installing Elementary OS Luna and Ubuntu 13.04, and now I am here with the list of must to do things after installing Ubuntu 13.10. While different people have different requirement and thus their to do list may differ from the one here, most of the things are still essential after a clean install.

Must to do things after installing Ubuntu 13.10

Update Ubuntu 13.10:

First and foremost thing after installing Ubuntu 13.10 is to update the system. Open a terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and use the following command:

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade

Install Ubuntu restricted extras:

“Ubuntu restricted extras” consists of several codecs that are not installed by default. The reason Ubuntu doesn’t include these codecs by default is because of legal constraints in many countries. But if you install these codecs, it is you who would be held responsible for the usage and not Ubuntu. Don’t worry its safe to install these codecs. With these codecs installed, you can play different media formats such as MP3, MP4, AVI and several other formats. Install it using the following command:

sudo apt-get install ubuntu-restricted-extras

Install Adobe Flash player:

Even after installing extra codecs, you may face difficulties with Adobe Flash player. You may not be able to run YouTube videos is one of the example. You can install Adobe Flash player using the following command:

sudo apt-get install flashplugin-installer

Install VLC media player:

The default video player Totem is quite good but VLC is the best open source media player for playing videos. Apart from playing almost all kind of media files, VLC can download subtitles automatically and you can also play YouTube videos with subtitles. Install VLC player in Ubuntu 13.10 using the following command:

sudo apt-get install vlc

Play encrypted DVD in Ubuntu 13.10:

Enable encrypted DVD playback in Ubuntu 13.10 using the following commands:

sudo apt-get install libdvdread4
sudo /usr/share/doc/libdvdread4/install-css.sh

Install RAR:

To avoid error like “There is no command installed for RAR archive files“ install RAR in the following manner:

sudo apt-get install rar

Get rid of “Sorry, Ubuntu 13.10 has experienced internal error”

Its a legacy now. It started with Ubuntu 12.04 and continue till date. Though totally harmless, this crash report is extremly annoying. You can disable the apport by editing the following file:

gksu gedit /etc/default/apport

Now, in this file look for the line # sudo service apport start force_start=1 enabled=1

Change the enabled=1 to enabled=0. For more detail steps, follow this article on how to get rid of Sorry, Ubuntu has experienced an internal error.

Install additional drivers in Ubuntu 13.10:

You may suffer from Wireless and graphics card related problem. To avoid such troubles, install the third part propriety drivers. Go to Unity Dash and search for Software & Updates. Open Software & Updates and click on Additional Drivers tab. If there are any additional propriety drivers for your system, it should be listed here.

Improve battery life and reduce overheating:

One of the important things to do is to take care of your laptop’s battery life and overheating issue. Until Ubuntu 12.10, Jupiter was the best tool to reduce overheating, but since its development has stopped, you can use TLP or CPUFREQ instead of Jupiter. Install TLP using the following command:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:linrunner/tlp
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install tlp tlp-rdw
sudo tlp start

And that’s it. No configuration required for using TLP. Install it and forget about it. Read this article on how to use CPUFREQ to reduce overheating in Ubuntu. Oh! By the way Jupiter is still available unofficially. But it is better to use TLP as Jupiter is no longer being developed. Your choice basically.

Install other desktop environments:

Unity is not everyone’s favourite, is it? You don’t need to ditch Ubuntu just because you hate Unity. Just replace Unity with your favourite Gnome or Cinnamon.

Install Gnome 3 in Ubuntu 13.10 using the following command:

sudo apt-get install gnome-shell ubuntu-gnome-desktop

Install latest stable Cinnamon in Ubuntu 13.10 using the following command:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gwendal-lebihan-dev/cinnamon-stable 
sudo apt-get update 
sudo apt-get install cinnamon

Tweak Unity and Gnome:

Not satisfied with the default looks of Ubuntu 13.10? You can always tweak it. Though you can do that using the options provided in Ubuntu itself, Unity Tweak Tool and Gnome Tweak Tool are excellent tools to tweak the appearance to any extent. Use the following commands:

sudo apt-get install unity-tweak-tool

sudo apt-get install gnome-tweak-tool

Install Java in Ubuntu 13.10:

Sooner or later, you’ll have to install Java. There is simply no escaping from it, no matter how much you try. Assuming that you are not going to do Java development, you’ll only need OpenJRE. Install Java in Ubuntu 13.10 using the following command:

sudo apt-get install icedtea-7-plugin openjdk-7-jre

Install Dropbox:

Ubuntu 13.10 now gives you the option of configuring Ubuntu One at installation time itself. But that does not stop me from using Dropbox, my favourite Cloud storage. You can install Dropbox from their website or by using this command:

sudo apt-get install dropbox

Privacy matters:

You can configure different types of security and privacy options by going in Security & Privacy in System Settings. You will find an option of turning off the online search suggestions in it. But since it will turn off all kind of online suggestion, you might not want to deteriorate your experience of Unity smart scopes. So, here is an option for you. Disable just the shopping suggestions and keep the rest (like Wikipedia suggestions) in the Dash. Use the following command to disable the shopping suggestions from Unity Dash (my theme cannot display the command properly, sorry for that):

gsettings set com.canonical.Unity.Lenses disabled-scopes "['more_suggestions-amazon.scope', 'more_suggestions-u1ms.scope', 'more_suggestions-populartracks.scope', 'music-musicstore.scope', 'more_suggestions-ebay.scope', 'more_suggestions-ubuntushop.scope', 'more_suggestions-skimlinks.scope']"

Of course this is not the end of it. There are several other things to do after installing Ubuntu 13.10 but I had to stop somewhere. I hope you find it useful. You can also check another useful post on how to speed up Ubuntu 13.10. What is your to-do list after installing Ubuntu? Did I miss anything here? Do share your views.