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New to Linux? You can use this section to ask any questions you might have.

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New to Linux? You can use this section to ask any questions you might have.

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Web Links to recommended apps:

https://www.zdnet.com/article/my-6-must-have-linux-apps-for-productivity-and-why-they-make-work-easier/

And here's a big list of popular Linux apps (click "32 more" to see the full list).

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My 6 must-have Linux apps for productivity, and why they make work easier

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Thinking about switching to Linux but worried about missing key apps? You might be surprised by how many productivity tools are available.

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A number of apps are identical or virtually identical on both Windows and Linux. These include for example web browsers (e.g. Chrome, Firefox, MS Edge).

If you use apps which are web-based rather than installed on your computer, it makes no difference whether you use Windows or Linux, you will have an identical experience when using these apps.

Instead of Microsoft Office you can use LibreOffice, or if you want an office application which is very similar in look and feel to MS Office then you can install WPS Office. Or you can use the web-based free version of MS Office.

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The site https://alternativeto.net/ is a handy source of alternatives.

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Linux distros (Ubuntu, Debian, Mint, etc).

Possible desktops (Gnome, Mate, Cinnamon, LXQT, Enlightenment, etc).

How to install Linux.

Open source apps and how to install them.

Favourite apps (survey of what people are using).

Alternatives to popular Windows apps.

Wine (a way of running some Windows apps).

Security issues (firewall etc).

Hardware issues (sound, printers, etc).

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This website has lots of excellent videos explaining all aspects of computers, including Linux. Here's a list of all its Linux videos.

If you are thinking of changing from Windows to Linux, this video is worth a look, and if you are interesting in installing Linux Mint, a popular version of Linux which looks and feels a bit like Windows, click here for a demonstration.

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I've drafted an "Installing GNU/Linux" talk here ... feel free to add comments. Talk includes live demo (without the aid of a safety net!)

Comments / requests more than welcome !

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In this talk we look at why you might want to migrate from Windows to Linux, a demo of actually doing the migration and finish with some special cases.

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I use Linux on the server, mostly using Orange pi single board computers, here are my most used apps.

Home Assistant for home automation

Immich for photo management

Searxng for private web searching

restic for backups

docker-mailserver for email hosting

Wordpress for my website

Calibre for ebooks

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Orange Pi - Orange Pi official website - Orange Pi development board, open source hardware, open source software, open source chip, computer keyboard

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Orange Pi is an open source product brand of Shenzhen Xunlong Software Co., Ltd; Orange Pi has iterated over 30 products. At present, orange Pi has formed a complete open source education ecosystem covering open source hardware, open source software, open source chips, supporting videos, and forum communities

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Anyone got stats for the most popular operating systems ? Just did a quick search and couldn't find it (most "top-10" sites just consider desktop or desktop + mobile).

I think its something like :

Desktop - dominated by various windows versions

Mobile - dominated by android (Linux)

Cloud servers (eg web server) - dominated by Linux

Home devices (set-top boxes etc) - dominated by Linux

When I was working I did a lot with Microsoft Azure (their cloud platform) ... then, even with Microsoft, vast majority of services were Linux.

Anyways, just wanted to make the point that Linux isn't an edge case ... its been around for years and is very widely used.

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The presentation "What is Linux?" from our meeting on 27 May.

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Amazingly Simple Graphic Design Software - Canva

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As one of the newbies from the initial meeting, I'm feeling rather pleased with myself. I've managed to create my new Padlet - and hopefully add this message to the general posts in the Linux Discussion Group

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The presentation "Linux Distros" from our meeting on 27 May.

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Check out this Presentation designed by Roger Carter.

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My laptop internal camera and microphone both work, but Zoom does not recognise the microphone, and I have to use a plug-in camera/microphone for these meetings.

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One of my favorites is Stellarium, an extremely comprehensive planetarium, and for graphics Gimp (Gnu Image Manipulation program) and Inkscape. Audacity is great for audio file creation and editing.

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Anyone had good experiences with video meetings in Linux?

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I don't much like any of the "official" Linux Mint backgrounds (wallpapers), so I've created my own. It includes a u3a IGO sticker. You can get the background here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xMg45QRXHcHVmwKfRAIRjtZFPpcR-5J_/view?usp=sharing

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I recommend enabling the firewall. This is done using sudo ufw enable. To keep unwelcome guests out of your computer.

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Interesting comparison of some of the operating systems available today.

And, in case you think windows is the only option (or linux for that matter), the operating system family tree can be found here https://eylenburg.github.io/os_familytree.htm

In the dim past I worked for UNIX System Laboratories who owned the System V UNIX source code (from Bell Labs / AT&T) and licenced it to HP, Sun, etc ... this ended up with UnixWare, just before Linux took off ... all just a footnote in history it seems !

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1993 ... A Linux/GNU/X distribution. Around the time of Windows 3 / early NT.

I do recall buying a book + set of floppies to install linux (slackware I think), I probably should have hung on to that.

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See above!

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DistroWatch.com: Put the fun back into computing. Use Linux, BSD.

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News and feature lists of Linux and BSD distributions.

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While Peter L. presented last week (on 17-Jun-25) in his U3A Communities group on how to install GNU/Linux, I can report on installations of Linux-Mint-Cinnamon on three old laptops (the oldest, an HP Pavilion, 4 GB, 2.3 GHz, is from 2010). The questions I was asked during the installation were similar to the GNU/Linux installation. In all three cases, the installation went smoothly and the OS recognised the printer on the WiFi and installed its drivers.

The only problem I had was that I did not verify the installation, as the available instructions were circular and incomprehensible. I used linuxmint.com/download.php.

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Anyone who owns a Windows computer should:

(1) get a complete detail inventory of what they have - thereby cataloguing all the valuable software licences they own including the Windows OS licence key and details of all components and

(2) email the report as a pdf to the cloud so that if the PC hard driver fails, the report is secure in the cloud.

They should do this on day one of switching on a new Windows PC. To avoid burning bridges when installing Linux as a Windows replacement, they should certainly run this inventory report to provide a way back from Linux.

The free app I recommend for this is: https://www.belarc.com/products/belarc-advisor It produces a report in html format. Best to “print” the report as a pdf and email it to yourself for safekeeping.

Then install Linux and forget about the report because I predict Linux adopters will never want to go back.

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I'm planning a move from Windows to Linux for my home PC. I intend to try Zorin, Mint and Kubuntu on an old PC first. Hints, ideas and suggestions welcome.

I'm already using LibreOffice, Thunderbird, Scribus and Brave, all of which are available on Linux, so I'm well placed.

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I have a Raspberry Pi 5 running an Apache web server. According to a number of support articles, when I reboot the RPi, Apache should restart automatically. But, for me, it doesn't.

I have tried running "systemctl enable apache2", as recommended on this page (and others), but it doesn't help.

Any suggestions?

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Two days after my Linux Security talk, a scary development was published. I have only just found it. You should read this link.

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AI-Generated Malware in Panda Image Hides Persistent Linux Threat

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Aqua Nautilus research uncovers Koske, a new, sophisticated AI-generated Linux malware that uses image-based delivery, rootkits, and stealthy persistence

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Here are the slides of my presentation on command line utilities (as a PDF).

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I wonder if I'm in company here... I've done several attempts at installing Mint, Kubuntu and Zorin into separate partitions alongside Windows on my main PC, and every one has nearly completed then failed at a late stage, usually with incomprehensible error reports or none.

I found that the EFI System Partition had to be much larger than guidance suggests - mine is now 1 GB - and also the space required for each install is larger than suggested; far from being the 40-80 GB that's in the literature, I'm now using 150 GB (200 for Zorin) and still having difficulties completing installs.

I'm using ISOs on USB sticks for Mint and Kubuntu and have also tried DVDs for them. I have a DVD for basic Zorin and also a USB stick for Zorin Pro. All have failed.

Ideas anybody?

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Hello all.

I've purchased Zorin Pro and wish to install it on my PC. But I've done 5 downloads of the ISO (one at night as the makers suggested), but every one has failed the SHA256 checksum test.

Does anybody have a validated Zorin Pro 17.3 ISO on a USB stick, that I could borrow next week? I can show the receipt to prove that I bought the right to download the product.

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Spotted this on the fediverse (where else?), thought it might be of interest to this group.

As it happens my wifes father has reached a point where he can't find things on his ipad ... I can't think of a more flexible desktop if you really want to configure everything to suit a person.

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I have a grandparent who has an old laptop with Windows 8 that they didn't use anymore. It was too confusing, basically. They are over 90 years old and can't really handle any of the complicated stuff anymore.

Linpus Linux

Back when I bought my very first laptop as a poor student, I had to go for the absolutely cheapest option available. I got the original Acer Aspire One-a netbook from 2008 which had a Linux and a Windows XP option. Newer versions of Windows already existed, but its CPU was too weak to handle those(!). The Linux version was cheaper, though, so that's what I went with.

It came installed with something called " Linpus Linux Lite ", a heavily restricted thing based on Fedora. It had these big buttons for a set number of programs, which couldn't be changed in any way. Nor could you install any other software... It was not really very usable or future-proof.

(Fortunately, you could install different Linux distributions on it, leading me to try out all kinds of different distributions. I ended up using CrunchBang Linux and then eventually ended up with Arch Linux which I still use today. This little netbook beast was a great gateway drug for Linux! But that's a story for another day.)

Goals

When I visited my grandparent the other day, they mentioned being sad to not be able to write simple word documents anymore and then printing them. He'd written down step-by-step instructions for all the things they had to do to get to work, but it'd all gotten muddled (and there were just Way. Too. Many. Steps, too!).

1. Start computer

2. Type in password

3. Double click on the "Word 2007" icon

4. Press "new file" (top left)

5. Etc.

The double-clicking alone was difficult already. And of course, the software was all meant for average power-users, too. Not to mention proprietary and constantly nagging to buy subscriptions for everything. Because Microsoft.

Long story short: I've taken their laptop with me and set it up to be as simple as possible. And readable for a visually impaired elderly person, of course. I went with Gnome, which for me was always too limiting in its customizability. And too minimal. But in this case, that seemed perfect. I used Arch Linux for this particular computer, as that's the distribution I'm most familiar with. But you should be able to do this on any other distribution.

All of these options are obviously optional. Pick and choose what you think will be useful for you. This article is meant for somewhat advanced users, able to install software themselves and able to change the occasional configuration file.

Display settings

I set the resolution a bit lower, which makes everything bigger. In the case of this particular laptop I went from 1600 x 900 to 1368 x 768. (Didn't do this after all... But it's something to consider!) I also set the desktop wallpaper to full black: with the Auto Activities extension discussed below, the overview screen becomes the de-facto desktop. Having the desktop wallpaper display in a separate shape would just add confusion and clutter to the screen, I think.

Multitasking

Disable Hot Corner

Keep Active Screen Edges, probably can't hurt.

Fix number of workspaces to 1. Workspaces are probably not a concept I can expect my grandparent to wrap their head around.

Accessibility

Take a look at the different options and use what seems useful to you. As soon as you select an option, an extra icon pops up in the top-right. To disable this, see Just Perfection settings below.

Privacy & Security

Screen Lock

Blank Screen Delay →Never. Whatever Automatic Suspend is set to will suffice, and this will hopefully reduce confusion.

Optional: remove password prompts.

For my grandparent, it is highly unlikely anyone else will want to reach their files. No internet banking or anything highly sensitive. So it's safe enough to disable the password prompts (which just confuse them).

In Gnome's preferences set up automatic log-in (System→Users→Automatic Login)

In Privacy & Security → Screen Lock, disable Automatic Screen Lock.

Geary (the email client) will still ask for your password each time you start it, now. I was going to leave the password (mostly to protect the user from themselves), but the only way to disable is is to change Gnome's keyring password to be empty. To so this, use the seahorse program, right-click the Login entry and select Change Password. Then enter the current password first and leave the new password fields empty.

In theory, they can now just close the laptop lid when they're done with whatever they want to do, and open it back up when they want to continue.

Gnome has an Overview feature that I thought would be easy to configure as a (hopefully) easy navigation centre for my grandparent. They press the super key (or Windows key), and an overview of all the open programs shows, as well as customizable launchers. Given that they only really use a word processor and e-mail (and okay maybe a browser), this results in just four buttons: the word processor, e-mail and internet. Using menulibre, I changed the names of these apps to "Internet", "E-mail" and "Word Processor", to remove any further questions there.

Changing those names did lead to the default app associations breaking (darn it), so I then used selectdefaultapplication-fork to set the default applications back. Gnome's built-in settings refused to acknowledge the differently-named programs as viable default app options, but selectdefaultapplication did. I was pleasantly surprised how well this worked.

My Grandparent only really wanted a word processor. But they do pay for an internet subscription and have an e-mail address, so I figured I'd add an e-mail client and an internet browser (just in case).

Here's what I went for, and some other useful software:

Abiword. Has much fewer options than LibreOffice, which is a good thing in this case.
I configured Abiword to save in the .odt format by default, just in case they want to one day share a file. Changing the default file saving format in Abiword is not trivial, as it turns out. Find your profile file in Abiword's configuration directory (usually in ~/.config/abiword), then find the section that starts with

Here, add the line DefaultSaveFormat=".odt".

Geary. This seemed the e-mail client with the least advanced options. Again, a good thing.

Firefox

Useful plugin: AdNauseam to block ads

Also Speed Dial 2 for a nice and easily customisable home screen.

Also installed the GNOME Shell integration. Can't hurt. Also needs gnome-browser-connector installed.

I Hate Tabs. I actually do not hate tabs, but my experience is that older users find them a difficult concept to understand.
I also turned on Firefox' new vertical tabs function, then dragged the sidebar to the left to effectively hide the tab bar.

Changed some scrollbar settings to be more friendly to the visually impaired following the instructions from this useful blog post from Athena's blog. (Internet Archive copy)

I have since taking the screenshot also removed the big firefox extension text in the address bar. For this, follow the instructions here.

Gnome Files (i.e. Nautilus). Changed the settings to sort directories before files and to open items with a single mouse click.

Rustdesk for remote help

Some games. Gnome Mahjongg, AisleRiot Solitaire, Gbrainy and Gnome Crosswords.

Fonts: Both set to APHont. I don't know if this font really reads better for people with poorer eyesight, but it can't hurt. It's not an ugly font, in any case.

Appearance: Icons to HighContrast. Cursor to Simp1e-amber-neron (Source).

Mouse: Disable Middle Click Paste. This will only lead to confusion.

I used four Gnome extensions to set up the computer:

Always show titles in overview

I pretty much left all settings for this extension at the default.

Just Perfection

My goal here was to disable as many things as possible that my grandparent wouldn't use. This reduces the visual clutter and, hopefully, confusion.

Visiblity settings

Keyboard Layout → Disable. Won't be used (in their case.)

Accessibility menu → Disable. Just another confusing icon, and I don't expect the user to set these options themselves.

Search → Disable. Won't be used.

Behavior settings

Window Maximized by Default → Enable. Good for the eyes.

Double Super to App Grid → Disable. Can only confuse.

Quick Settings Tweaks

Toggles

I turned off the DND Quick Toggle. Not a concept I want to try explaining to my grandparent. They will not usually get many notifications, anyway.

Layout

Quick toggles layout:

Dark Mode Toggle Button → Hide. Just another unused setting.

Night Light Toggle Button → Hide.

Airplane Mode Toggle Button → Hide.

Power Mode → Hide.

Bluetooth Toddle → Hide. I considered leaving this, but they don't have any bluetooth devices. So why leave it?

System items layout:

Capture button → Hide.

Settings button → Hide. You can still reach this through the overview menu.

Lock button → Hide.

Auto Activities

Just the default settings here. Makes it so that the overview window automatically shows when the last active program has been closed.

To add big scrollbars with arrow buttons at the top and bottom (which seems a much saner GUI choice for seniors), create a file called gtk.css in ~/.config/gtk-3.0 and ~/.config/gtk-4.0. Create these directories if they don't already exist.

Put the following content in the files:
~/.config/gtk-3.0/gtk.css
GTK 4.0 doesn't support "scrollbar steppers" anymore (those arrows at the top and bottom of a scrollbar). They are apparently an accessibility issue, as the click targets are too small. Which I get, although with these chunky scrollbars the click targets would be significantly larger. Anyway, to just have the larger scrollbars, add the following:
~/.config/gtk-4.0/gtk.css
We'll have to teach our grandparents to scroll with the mouse wheel, I suppose.

And there you have it! I'm yet to actually test this set-up with my grandparent, but I figured I might as well share what I have so far. Of course, you'll also need to include a printed document with screenshots and instructions for the common things they will want to do. I'll share the one I'm writing here, once it's done.

Until next time,
Sebastiaan Ammerlaan

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The final result of following this guide. I have a grandparent who has an old laptop with Windows 8 that they d...

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Here are the slides from my presentation on the Mint Cinnamon desktop (as a PDF).

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FYI, the fediverse site https://u3a.social is alive !

Feel free to sign up for an account on the site.

If you already have a fediverse account you can follow me at plord@u3a.social and/or join the u3acommunities computing group by following u3acommunitiescomputing@u3a.social .

I plan to run a talk soon, probabaly in the new year, about actually using the site.

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Click on the picture above to discover how to set up your personal Linux "Help" system. Or you can share my Help system. Press the spacebar to move through the slides.

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Notebook LM - u3a IGO Linux Discussion Group

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It is possible to install Asahi Linux on Apple MacBooks with an M1 or M2 CPU. It installs alongside macOS. See this video for further information.

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New year, new OS for this M1 MacBook Air! I’ve been using Asahi Linux (via the flagship Fedora Asahi Remix) for a few weeks now. It’s been my everyday laptop and I’m really impressed with how it’s…

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The SSL certificate for my personal website expired on 17th April. IIRC, I had created it using openssl, got my domain registrar (fasthosts) to sign it, and installed it manually on the Raspberry Pi that hosts the website. This time, I tried the certbot app to re-certify the site.

phil@raspberrypi:~ $ sudo certbot --apache

That seemed to work and created a ploid-le-ssl.conf file under /etc/apache2/sites-available (and a symbolic link in sites-enabled). I then removed the old ploid-ssl.conf symbolic link using the a2dissite script.

At that point, my site was inaccessible. Firefox just reported an unspecified problem; Safari reported too many redirects. Looking at the config file, I saw that it was redirecting the URL for my website's home page to the very same page. That, of course, led to an infinite redirect loop.

Having commented out the redirect directive, everything started working again. So, my question for this group is, what did I do wrong that caused certbot to do that?

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Here's a cartoon from the Fediverse ...