eeePC? Not just for meee

April 15, 2009 2:05 PM

I'm installing Ubuntu 9.04 remix on a friend's eeePC and I'm looking for suggestions on cool and useful programs for netbooks (or not) to install beyond the defaults that come with Ubuntu.
posted by tdreyer to computers & internet (13 comments total)

Opera has an excellent full-screen/fit-to-screen mode that make small netbook screens act like full-size desktop monitors. It's excellent.
posted by unixrat at 2:15 PM on April 15 [1 favorite]

Dropbox? Nifty file syncing that works on linux/mac/windows and is free for up to 2 gb. I use it to link my ubuntu/windows computers.
posted by a womble is an active kind of sloth at 2:29 PM on April 15 [2 favorites]

Whatever you install for them, make sure to explain to your friend that they can simply go to the Applications drop down and then select Add/Remove to search through a huge list of available apps. This is assuming that you will have them using the default GNOME desktop.

One of the first things I grabbed for my netbook was an SNES emulator and some ROMs. Playing old console games on a netbook is somehow very appropriate and fun.

Nicotine-Plus is a great file sharing (almost exclusively music) service based on Soulseek.

Does GIMP install by default? I forget. If not, get that too. Great free Photoshop type software.

If your friend is doing academic work, I'd recommend Texmaker, which is basically LaTex.

The R statistical computing environment is great for anyone in the sciences to learn, but will require a little extra work to install.
posted by Derive the Hamiltonian of... at 2:34 PM on April 15

Skype!!!
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 4:09 PM on April 15

Oh, and make sure openoffice.org's spell checker is installed. On 8.04 remix, it wasn't by default, for some reason.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 4:10 PM on April 15

Out of curiosity, why remix instead of Easy Peasy? I thought Easy Peasy (used to be Ubuntu Eee) was the canonical Ubuntu-based netbook distro. I actually didn't know there were others. Does the remix have some better features?
posted by vsync at 4:20 PM on April 15

@vsync Unfortunately, the Easy Peasy wiki is down right now :( When it's back up, I'll look into it too. Thanks for the mention!
posted by tdreyer at 4:33 PM on April 15

Netbook remix rocks, but make sure to turn off graphics effects. The remix isn't designed to use them and they will likely cause all sorts of problems.

As for apps:
Skype
VLC
Wine
Beagle

If you decide to dual-boot with XP, check out the WUBI installer, which installs Ubuntu from within Windows. Once Ubuntu is ready, you can make it the default OS (Windows,Control Panel, System, Advanced, StartUp and Recovery Settings).
posted by MotorNeuron at 4:47 PM on April 15

Boxee is growing in popularity. While 9.04 isn't officially supported yet, there's a guide on the forums about how to install it.
posted by JuiceBoxHero at 5:47 PM on April 15

@vsyncEasy Peasy is an unofficial sub-distrobution of Ubuntu. Ubuntu netbook remix is official and supported by canonical.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Ubuntu-based_distributions#Ubuntu-based
posted by tdreyer at 5:57 PM on April 15

Skip the Netbook Remix. It's really pretty useless. Just install regular Ubuntu, and do the following:
1. (First and foremost): Add the array.org repository and install the eeePC kernel and config scripts. They aren't out for Jaunty yet, but they will be soon after the official release.
2. Set the GNOME font sizes low
3. Use Compiz Fusion and set the taskbar to the widget layer, thus freeing up the entire screen, and unset the "Constrain Y" option (if you're using the GConf config backend, run "gconftool-2 --type bool --set /apps/compiz/plugins/move/allscreens/options/constrain_y 0"). Even the eee 701, which I'm typing this on now, can run Compiz with as much eyecandy as you want.
4. Install Avant Window Navigator for a program launcher, set it to autohide
5. Install the TinyMenu and Fullerscreen extensions in Firefox, move everything to the top toolbar and delete the others

There's other stuff you can do to make Ubuntu more low-res-netbook friendly, but these are the major ones.
posted by DecemberBoy at 10:00 PM on April 15 [1 favorite]

We got two Aspire Ones for Christmas, and following advise offered up by PhoBWanKenobi we installed UNR on them.

Versatile, solid and very dependable machines once UNR was installed.

About the only app not mentioned in this thread so far that we've found indispensable is the Zattoo P2P TV player.

My wife and I both work in finance and find having netbooks with full access to news and Bloomberg TV is indispensable. Apparently Zattoo locks some regions out from Bloomberg TV; a mate is using LiveStation to circumvent this problem; we haven't tried to install ourselves.
posted by Mutant at 1:32 AM on April 16

I've spent the last week or so configuring Ubuntu on my Lenovo S10. My advice is to dump Evolution (the bundled email client) for Thunderbird (with Lightning/Sunbird, if you need a calendar). Get GNOME Do for a launcher. Pidgin for instant messaging.

I'm excited about DecemberBoy's low-res ideas. I've got my system fonts set to 8, but I really miss the way OS X consolidates toolbars and menus. Compviz Fusion looks really helpful there.
posted by clockwork at 7:51 AM on April 16