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Xubuntu/XFCE – Adding Custom (Quick-Launch) Tool Bar Launchers
The quick launch bar so familiar to pretty much every operating system and window manager these days, is a valuable asset, simplifying the need to navigate through several menus to start up any application you use regularly. XFCE is no different. XFCE has a quick way to add applications to your launch bar but when you look through the list of applications it provides it is far from complete and in many cases may not contain the application you want to add. No worries This article will show you step by step how to add a “custom” program launcher to your bar.
Add launch bar menu
First we’re going to right-click a space on the launch bar at the top or bottom of the screen as this can be done to the popup launcher as well, and were going to select “Panel” -> “Add New Items…: This will bring up an item list of objects you can add. From this list select “Launcher” and click the “Add” button and then click “Close”. You should now see a screen icon in the right side of your launcher bar. Now, right-click this icon and select “Properties.” When the dialog open there are going to be some icons to the right that allow you to manage your launcher items as each launcher can have several sub application items. Select the “+” which will bring up another Dialog with a list of applications for you to add. If you can’t find the application you want to add close this window and click the icon below the “+” and you can create a custom launcher item,
Adding the launcher item
This part is pretty straight forward. You will give it a name for the launcher to have, in my case I’m adding “Gui2Py”, add comment if any “This is a GUI editor for Python”,add the full path to the command you would like to run in my case it’s “python -m gui.tools.designer”,the working directory is going to be the directory it loads by default using your home directory by either using “~” or “$home” should work as a default. Otherwise provide the full path, you can then set a custom icon either from their list or one you provide, when startup notification is set, the panel and cursor notifies the user that the application has started. When the application appears onscreen, the panel and cursor return to normal. This enables the desktop to use whatever startup notification is built in to either your applicationMost modern toolkits work transparently with the startup notification system. And finally “Run In Termial” will launch a terminal window and then execute the program, This is particularly useful if the program has verbose output in addition to a GUI. With all of that done all you gotta do is click create and your done. Remember this can also be one for the lower popup launcher as well.
To move the launcher icon elsewhere in the “Quick Launch Bar” simply right-click and select “Move” then move your cursor where you would like it and left-click and it will be placed where your cursor is.
Johnny February 27th, 2014
Posted In: Ubuntu, Uncategorized
Tags: launch bar, Tool Bar Launchers, window manager, xfce
Ubuntu – No Sound After Installing XFCE/Xubuntu
Sometimes after installing XFCE/Xubuntu along side Ubuntu LightDM the configuration for your present and active sound devices will get overwritten or removed. The first thing you should do is go to “Application Menu -> Multimedia -> Pulse Volume Control” Click the “Configuration” tab and check what audio devices it is listing. If it doesn’t display any skip to the section titled “Update”.
Check:
Configuration
Output Devices
If it shows your sound devices click the “Output Devices” tab and make sure the sound device which should be outputting sound is not muted and that it has “Speakers” or “Headphones” in the “port” dropdown box which ever the case may be. Your sound should be functional now
Update:
If the “Configuration” tab doesn’t show any of your audio devices run the following commands from a terminal window.
killall pulseaudio; rm -r ~/.config/pulse/* ; rm -r ~/.pulse* If it says it couldn't remove the files in question it means pulse never created them when it was loaded.
Now run the following commands from terminal, once they have completed reboot your computer, once you are back in XFCE open “Pulse Volume Control” and follow the directions from the section titled Check.
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-audio-dev/ppa; sudo apt-get update;sudo apt-get dist-upgrade; sudo apt-get install pavucontrol linux-sound-base alsa-base alsa-utils lightdm ubuntu-desktop linux-image-`uname -r` libasound2; sudo apt-get -y –reinstall install linux-sound-base alsa-base alsa-utils lightdm ubuntu-desktop linux-image-`uname -r` libasound2; killall pulseaudio; rm -r ~/.pulse*; ubuntu-support-status; sudo usermod -aG `cat /etc/group | grep -e ‘^pulse:’ -e ‘^audio:’ -e ‘^pulse-access:’ -e ‘^pulse-rt:’ -e ‘^video:’ | awk -F: ‘{print $1}’ | tr ‘\n’ ‘,’ | sed ‘s:,$::g’` `whoami`
Johnny October 28th, 2013
Tags: active sound devices, audio devices, no sound, pulse, pulse audio, Pulse Volume Control, pulseaudio, sound, sound card, sound device, ubuntu 10, ubuntu 11, ubuntu 12, ubuntu xfce, xfce, xfce4
Ubuntu – Disabling GDM/LightDM Gui Login Screen
If your like me and are not a fan of the gui login screen that ubuntu uses or you want to reduce resource usage you can do the following to disable the gui login and rather use a console login instead.
echo "manual" | sudo tee -a /etc/init/lightdm.override
You can also do this with GDM
echo “manual” | sudo tee -a /etc/init/gdm.override
This prevents the desktop manager from loading it’s service, you will now either need to start lightdm manually or have a different window manager installed because with out lightdm being started unity will not work. You can restart lightdm by doing the following
sudo service lightdm start
I personally use XFCE rather than lightdm since it uses less resources, you can edit the ..xinitrc file in your home directory to change which window manager you are using. If you do not have another window manager installed please read Changing Window Managers, which will guide you through the installation process.
If the file .xinitrc is not in your home directory create the file and chmod +x .xinitrc
In the .xinitrc you will find a line like
#!/usr/bin/env bash exec xfce-se
You will change this to whichever window manager you would like to use.
I’ve listed a few available window manager
WM=gnome-session WM=startkde WM=afterstep WM=wmaker WM=enlightenment WM=blackbox WM=icewm
Once you have finished when you reboot you will be greeted with a text login prompt and can use startx to start your xsession.
No sound after rebooting into XFCE or other window manager read No Sound After Installing XFCE/Xubuntu
Johnny October 27th, 2013
Tags: gui, gui login, lightdm, login screen, startx, text login, Ubuntu, ubuntu 12, xfce, xsession
Ubuntu – Changing Window Managers (Gnome/KDE/XFCE/LXDE)
Using one of the many versions of Ubuntu but want to use a different window manager than the one it came with? This can be done quickly and easily by installing the window manager you wish to use and logging out and back in. Sound simple enough? It is.
To install your new window manager you can use the following commands through a terminal.
For LXDE
sudo apt-get install lxde
for XFCE
sudo apt-get install xubuntu-desktop
for Gnome
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gnome3-team/gnome3
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install gnome-shell
For KDE
sudo apt-get install kde-plasma-desktop
Once you install the one you want, log out, choose the one you want by clicking the icon next to your username, and log in.
No sound after rebooting into XFCE or other window manager read No Sound After Installing XFCE/Xubuntu
Johnny October 23rd, 2013
Posted In: How To
Tags: change window manager, Gnome, kde, Linux, sessions manager, Ubuntu, window manager, Window Managers, xfce