Which is the best Linux Distribution for you?

Choosing a right linux distribution is depend on your taste, requirements, and availability of internet connection. Here I am summarizing the idea of a best linux distribution suited for you.

For Desktop users with latest hardware:
1. Fedora: Many will not be agree with me in this choice. I choose fedora because it provides you latest software and latest version of kernel. You need to do a little hard-work after installing Fedora, but afterwards it works very fine. The other reason is its games spin. You will get a plenty of games. Moreover Fedora is up-to-date with latest hardware. To install proprietary drivers you need to do a little work but in fedora you will get best replacement drivers for those proprietary drivers.

2. Mageia: This is an awesome distribution with a nice way to manage all your drivers and softwares. It has a lot of features and support for printing and scanning out of the box. It realeases a new version after a long time of testing.

3. Ubuntu: This is most used linux distribution out there. It has nice integration of software center and terminal apt-get. The best thing about it a very large user community and a lot of forums to help you out with your problems.

For Desktops with old hardwares:
1. Fedora LXDE: Again here is Fedora because it provides best support for old hardware. Instead of GNOME use LXDE desktop environment for installation.

2. Puppy Linux: It is another good way to use you old PC. It is extremely lightweight and run like butter with your old PC.

3. LUbuntu: It is Ubuntu based Linux distro but uses LXDE desktop environment instead of Unity.

For No or slow Network connectivity:
1. LMDE: It is Linux Mint Debian Edition. This edition comes all the media codec required and very less software updates.

2. Linux Mint: Use it if you have little access to internet. This also come with all the media codecs out of the box, so no need to install media codecs and flash-plugin after installation.

3. Debian: Use debian which comes with media codecs out of the box. Hence your PC is ready to use after installing Debian

For Laptop Users:
1. Fedora: Now again many users will not be agree with me in this choice, but believe me this is the best distro for laptop users. It is the best in detecting your mobile broadband connection via 3G or 4G dongle. The dashboard is awesome using GNOME3. Using Fedora there is very less time when you need to touch your touchpad. Press the window button and you will see all your open windows there and then you can type any application name to access that app.

2. Ubuntu: With its nice and elegant look it looks superb with a laptop. Sometimes you may feel frustrated with Unity desktop but you can learn the shortcuts and then it will just fit in your requirements.

3. OpenSuse: This is again one of the best Linux distro for wireless connection management. Very stable and nice one to use with your laptop.

4. Linux Mint: The Cinnamon desktop environment is really excellent and easy to use. It gives you a nice feeling and a lot of desklets. Your laptop will work awesome as it uses Ubuntu software base.

Things to DO after installing Ubuntu 14.04

As Ubuntu has released its latest version 14.04 and many more community driven desktop environments. Ubuntu has not come with complete set of application out of the box like Linux Mint. You need to install some codecs and apps to work it out.

Here is what you can do after installing Ubuntu 14.04. After first step you can download the file and proceed as given in the file.

1. Enabling Canonical Repo.....

Go to dash board and type software and click on Software and Updates. A window like this will appear.

Now choose canonical partners from the tab "Other Software". It may ask to reload.

Now you can download the file from here. It is an .sh file. All the following commands are listed in this file. You just need to execute the file using ./ubudate.sh and it will do rest of the things. Before that you need to make this file executable using command chmod a+x ubudate.sh Otherwise you can install manually these software as your choice.


2. Now run command to update the system.

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

3. Install Multimedia Codecs...

sudo apt-get install ubuntu-restricted-extras

4. Install VLS and SMPlayer for video playing

sudo apt-get install vlc smplayer

5. Music players and xbmc

sudo apt-get install banshee rhythmbox minitube xbmc

6. install compression stuff

sudo apt-get install p7zip-rar p7zip-full unace unrar zip unzip sharutils rar uudeview mpack arj cabextract file-roller

7. Install filezilla

sudo apt-get install filezilla

8. Install flash-player

sudo apt-get install flashplugin-installer

9. Install Chromium(I suggest Chromium instead of google-chrome)

sudo apt-get install chromium-browser

10. WGET

sudo apt-get install wget

11. Google talk plugin

wget -c --tries=0 "https://dl.google.com/linux/direct/google-talkplugin_current_amd64.deb"

sudo dpkg -i google-talkplugin*.deb

12. tweak tool

sudo apt-get install gnome-tweak-tool unity-tweak-tool

13. Skype

sudo apt-get install skype

14. Java

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

15. GIMP

sudo apt-get install gimp

16. compizconfig-settings-manager

sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager

mmm.... there are many more but these are enough...

Ubuntu 14.04 Installation Guide with snapshots and Review

Ubuntu released first version of its 2014 year last month. It is Ubuntu 14.04(year.month). It is fantastic version with improved dash board and decent graphics. However I prefer GNOME 3 over Ubuntu's Unity desktop but it seems like a lot of people like this interface. It is built on GNOME 3 only.

To install Ubuntu on your desktop or laptop you need to download the

Here is step by step guide to install Ubuntu 14.04.

1. First burn the downloaded image to a DVD or make bootable pendrive. Now boot your PC with the bootable drive.

2. After booting a screen like this will appear. Click on install Ubuntu if you wanted to install it now, or you can try it with try Ubuntu. After testing there will be a Install ubuntu button on top left. Click it to install Ubuntu.

3. These screens are self explanatory. You can go through these and see the options.

4. If you wanted a custom partition then choose option "Something else". You can refer other post like "Linux Mint Installation Guide" for this partition example.

5. The installation of Ubuntu is complete. Now you can restart the system to use your latest installation.

6. After restart a login window will appear. Enter the password and enjoy your new Ubuntu installation.

 Enjoy your Ubuntu and keep your system updated. See my other post for the things to do after installing Ubuntu.

Install Ambiance theme in Fedora 20

Ambiance in default theme in Ubuntu. The look and feel of Ubuntu is very simple and pleasant. Their Humanity icon set is also catchy and default purple terminal is different from other linux distributions, which differentiate it from others. However latest Adwaita theme is also catchy and simple and improved a lot in terms of finishing from there previous releases.

If you want to install Ambiance theme in fedora then you need to install light-theme-gnome and gnome-tweak-tool. The theme is there in light-theme-gnome and you need gnome-tweak-tool for setting.

Become superuser by running command su on terminal before running these commands

yum install light-theme-gnome
yum install gnome-tweak-tool

After this run application Tweak-tool by searching tweak in application and go to Appearance. Now select Ambiance for Window and GTK+, Humanity for Icons and Dmz for Cursor. It will give you Ubuntu like appearance in Fedora. Below are 2 snapshots for the feel.

 Tweak-tool settings to set appearance to look like Ubuntu

Desktop screenshot with Ambiance theme.