Create A Gnome Panel Icon For Triggering The Compiz Expo Plugin (Like In Unity)

Expo Compiz

If you've tried (or seen some video) Unity, you've surely noticed the Compiz Expo icon on the Unity dock (launcher). There is no Gnome panel applet to do this but you can do this thanks to xautomation. Here is how to replicate this behavior in any Ubuntu version, using the normal Gnome desktop.


1. Install xautomation and CCSM:
sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager xautomation



2. Set a Compiz Expo plugin key binding:

Compiz expo plugin key binding


Go to System > Preferences > CompizConfig Settings Manager and enable the "Expo" plugin. Then click it and on the "Bindings" tab, set a keyboard shortcut for the "Expo key" (first item on the list) - I've set "e" so that's what I am going to use for the commands in this post.



3. Optional: multiple desktop rows:


Compiz expo multiple desktop rows

By default, expo displays one big wall, but if you want multiple rows (like in Unity - and in my screenshot), go to CompizConfig Settings Manager, click on "General options" and on the "Desktop Size" tab, set the "Vertical Virtual Size" to some number larger then 1. I've used "2" for both "Horizontal Vertical Size" and "Vertical Virtual Size".



4. Create a new custom application launcher:

Custom application launcher

Right click on a Gnome panel, select "Add to panel" and add a "Custom Application Launcher". Set the following image as its icon (this is the icon used in Unity, you can however use whatever icon you want):


Compiz expo
(save it to your computer)


For your custom launcher name enter whatever you want and under "Command", enter this:
xte 'keydown Super_L' 'key e' 'keyup Super_L'
(This assumes you've used "e" as the Expo key binding under step 2, if not, modify it to whatever custom keybinding you've used). 


That's it! Save the custom application launcher and try it out.
Force quitting rogue applications could do with looking better.
According to you guys that is, who often send us your ideas on how unresponsive application notifications should be shown.
Alejandro send us his ideal design, pictured above, after becoming tired of having to run ‘xkill’ yet again after an application hanged.
On his design he says “I find it much more user-friendly and better looking than a pop-window.” Looking at the ‘pop up window’ style I have to agree…
How would you like to see Force Quit dialogues displayed?

Gnome Shell - Tron Legacy

 

This is a GNOME Shell theme inspired by the film Tron Legacy. Icons in the screenshot are also provided.

Font used is called Zero Threes

Light Cycle wallpaper

Instructions:

Backup your /usr/share/gnome-shell/theme directory (or where ever you have GNOME shell installed).

Extract the zip file and copy the theme directory to /usr/share/gnome-shell/

Restart GNOME Shell by Alt, F2, then type r and press enter.

Icons

Icons are in the directories that correspond to your icon theme. Backup your current icon theme and replace the icons in their directories. Apps use 48x48, places use 16x16, the application switcher uses scalable and the status menu uses 16x16. Your icon themes are in either /usr/share/icons or locally ~/.icons.

Switching Fonts

To use different fonts in GNOME Shell, just open the gnome-shell.css file found in your theme directory and find lines font: 10px sans; Replace "sans" with your font name, save the file and restart GNOME Shell. You must be superuser to do this.

NOTE

I recommend a version of GNOME Shell 2.31.2 to 2.31.5(out of date but 2.31.5 is installable with most recent distros like Ubuntu 10.10 and Fedora 14). Please don't use with Git(Jhbuild), since GNOME Shell has had a re-layout.

Performance

Due to the heavy use of shadows to achieve the glow, the performance may not be smooth on some systems. This is beyond my control, however remember that GNOME Shell is still in heavy development and does not reflect the final release quality.

See the GNOME Shell group for more info.

Git re-layout version is here, WIP [link]
The following theme mock-up by ~RustedThorn may be a tad indulgent on the branding scales, and closing an application via a menu every time would get real annoying real fast, but you know what? I really don’t care. It looks beautiful.
ubuntu_theme_mockup_v3_by_rustedthorn-d36ve27
Check out the full image @ rustedthorn.deviantart.com

Install VirtualBox 4.0 Ubuntu

 

Virtualbox 4.0 Installer and updater
by:Nikolai Rachmaninoff, Envied Ubuntu Group.

Description:After the discrete success of the beta version of the script, I decided to prepare a stable and definitive version.The script will add the official Oracle Virtualbox repository and install Virtualbox 4.0.

Tested on:Ubuntu 10.10 (i386 and amd64);Should work on 10.04 and Linux Mint 9/10 as well.

Instructions:
1)Download the .tar.gz and unpack it.
2)Run the script by double clicking it.
3)After the Virtualbox has started you can remove the extension pack from your desktop.

More information:

VirtualBox 4.0.0 (released 2010-12-22)

This version is a major update. The following major new features were added:

* Reorganization of VirtualBox into a base package and Extension Packs; see chapter 1.5, Installing VirtualBox and extension packs, see the manual for more information
* New settings/disk file layout for VM portability; see chapter 10.1, Where VirtualBox stores its files, see the manual for more information
* Major rework of the GUI (now called “VirtualBox Manager”):
o Redesigned user interface with guest window preview (also for screenshots)
o New “scale” display mode with scaled guest display; see chapter 1.8.5, Resizing the machine’s window, see the manual for more information
o Support for creating and starting .vbox desktop shortcuts (bug #1889)
o The VM list is now sortable
o Machines can now be deleted easily without a trace including snapshots and saved states, and optionally including attached disk images (bug #5511; also, VBoxManage unregistervm --delete can do the same now)
o Built-in creation of desktop file shortcuts to start VMs on double click (bug #2322)
* VMM: support more than 1.5/2 GB guest RAM on 32-bit hosts
* New virtual hardware:
o Intel ICH9 chipset with three PCI buses, PCI Express and Message Signaled Interrupts (MSI); see chapter 3.4.1, “Motherboard” tab, see the manual for more information
o Intel HD Audio, for better support of modern guest operating systems (e.g. 64-bit Windows; bug #2785)
* Improvements to OVF support (see chapter 1.12, Importing and exporting virtual machines, see the manual for more information):
o Open Virtualization Format Archive (OVA) support
o Significant performance improvements during export and import
o Creation of the manifest file on export is optional now
o Imported disks can have formats other than VMDK
* Resource control: added support for limiting a VM’s CPU time and IO bandwidth; see chapter 5.8, Limiting bandwidth for disk images, see the manual for more information
* Storage: support asynchronous I/O for iSCSI, VMDK, VHD and Parallels images
* Storage: support for resizing VDI and VHD images; see chapter 8.21, VBoxManage modifyhd, see the manual for more information.
* Guest Additions: support for multiple virtual screens in Linux and Solaris guests using X.Org server 1.3 and later
* Language bindings: uniform Java bindings for both local (COM/XPCOM) and remote (SOAP) invocation APIs

In addition, the following items were fixed and/or added:

* VMM: Enable large page support by default on 64-bit hosts (applies to nested paging only)
* VMM: fixed guru meditation when running Minix (VT-x only; bug #6557)
* VMM: fixed crash under certain circumstances (Linux hosts only, non VT-x/AMD-V mode only; bugs #4529 and #7819)
* GUI: add configuration dialog for port forwarding in NAT mode (bug #1657)
* GUI: show the guest window content on save and restore
* GUI: certain GUI warnings don’t stop the VM output anymore
* GUI: fixed black fullscreen minitoolbar on KDE4 hosts (Linux hosts only; bug #5449)
* BIOS: implemented multi-sector reading to speed up booting of certain guests (e.g. Solaris)
* Bridged networking: improved throughput by filtering out outgoing packets intended for the host before they reach the physical network (Linux hosts only; bug #7792)
* 3D support: allow use of CR_SYSTEM_GL_PATH again (bug #6864)
* 3D support: fixed various clipping/visibility issues (bugs #5659, #5794, #5848, #6018, #6187, #6570)
* 3D support: guest application stack corruption when using glGetVertexAttrib[ifd]v (bug #7395)
* 3D support: fixed OpenGL support for libMesa 7.9
* 3D support: fixed Unity/Compiz crashes on natty
* 2D Video acceleration: multimonitor support
* VRDP: fixed rare crash in multimonitor configuration
* VRDP: support for upstream audio
* Display: fixed occasional guest resize crash
* NAT: port forwarding rules can be applied at runtime
* SATA: allow to attach CD/DVD-ROM drives including passthrough (bug #7058)
* Floppy: support readonly image files, taking this as the criteria for making the medium readonly (bug #5651)
* Audio: fixed memory corruption during playback under rare circumstances
* Audio: the DirectSound backend now allows VMs to be audible when another DirectSound application is active, including another VM (bug #5578)
* EFI: support for SATA disks and CDROMs
* BIOS: reduce the stack usage of the VESA BIOS function #4F01 (Quake fix)
* OVF/OVA: fixed export of VMs with iSCSI disks
* Storage: Apple DMG image support for the virtual CD/DVD (bug #6760)
* Linux host USB support: introduced a less invasive way of accessing raw USB devices (bugs #1093, #5345, #7759)
* Linux hosts: support recent Linux kernels with CONFIG_DEBUG_SET_MODULE_RONX set
* Guest Additions: Shared Folders now can be marked as being auto-mounted on Windows, Linux and Solaris guests
* Linux Additions: Shared Folders now support symbolic links (bug #818)
* Linux Additions: combined 32-bit and 64-bit additions into one file
* Windows Additions: automatic logon on Windows Vista/Windows 7 is now able to handle renamed user accounts; added various bugfixes

Changelog:

03/01/2011
-The script has been updated to version 1.1.Now the script downloads the extensionpack and installs it by opening it with Virtualbox.
04/01/201
-Code corrected to v.1.2.


(Virtualbox 4.0 Installer)

Source GnomeLook

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