» Jonas Ferry on things of interest

Xubuntu Linux, clean install

7 Nov 2007 — categorized in computers

When I last talked about my computer it was on the problems and progress with using Gentoo Linux. I’ve since switched, first to Ubuntu and then to Xubuntu. Xubuntu is a light-weight version of Ubuntu that uses Xfce as its window manager instead of Ubuntu’s GNOME.

I recently switched once again, when Xubuntu 7.10 was released. I figured, since I have a 64-bit AMD processor I could try the 64-bit version of the operating system. Last time I tried was Gentoo a year ago, and I had trouble with getting flash to work in Firefox, plus a lot of other things that just weren’t mature enough. This time I haven’t had any problems yet, and I think 64-bit Linux has come a long way.

One of the main features of Ubuntu/Xubuntu is that everything works out of the box: you get Firefox and Thunderbird, it detects printers and scanners automatically and so on. But you also get a lot of stuff you don’t need, like media players and word processors you don’t always want anyway. I’ve wanted the option to choose what’s installed when installing Ubuntu, and this time I found out how. If you use the alternate CD you can install a basic command line system, without a graphical interface or any programs, and then complete the installation with the things you need. With one command from the freshly-installed command line I had Xfce, Firefox, Thunderbird and so on, without the extra media players and stuff. This slimmed the installation size and the system will hopefully run faster without extra processes running in the background.

I’ll list some pages that helped me, for later reference. Maybe I’ll add some more later.

If you’re curious about Linux and want to try something easy I recommend the Ubuntu default installation. You’ll get a complete system that keeps updating installed programs without nagging like that other operating system about authentication or illegal unlicensed downloads.

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