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Ubuntu Install Cheatsheet

Common install and cleanup commands for Ubuntu, kept around for copy-paste.

published Mar 13, 2017 tags #linux #ubuntu

~/posts/ubuntu-install-guide $ cat post.md

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Add swap on a low-memory machine

sudo fallocate -l 1G /swapfile
sudo chmod 600 /swapfile
sudo mkswap /swapfile
sudo swapon /swapfile
sudo swapon --show
sudo cp /etc/fstab /etc/fstab.bak
echo '/swapfile none swap sw 0 0' | sudo tee -a /etc/fstab
sudo sysctl vm.swappiness=10
echo 'vm.swappiness=10' | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf
sudo sysctl vm.vfs_cache_pressure=50
echo 'vm.vfs_cache_pressure=50' | sudo tee -a /etc/sysctl.conf

Theme

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:noobslab/themes
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install flatabulous-theme
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:noobslab/icons
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ultra-flat-icons

DigitalOcean agent

curl -sSL https://agent.digitalocean.com/install.sh | sh

G++

sudo apt-get install g++

Steam / NVIDIA drivers

The modern way to install NVIDIA drivers on Ubuntu 14.04+:

Add the graphics-drivers PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:graphics-drivers/ppa
sudo apt-get update

Install the recommended driver:

sudo ubuntu-drivers autoinstall

Reboot:

sudo reboot

If that doesn’t work, or you want to pick a specific driver:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:graphics-drivers/ppa
sudo apt-get update

Purge anything nvidia-related already installed:

sudo apt-get purge nvidia\*

Check which drivers are available:

ubuntu-drivers devices

Install one:

sudo apt-get install nvidia-361

Reboot:

sudo reboot

Chrome

wget -q -O - https://dl-ssl.google.com/linux/linux_signing_key.pub | sudo apt-key add -
sudo sh -c 'echo "deb [arch=amd64] http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable main" >> /etc/apt/sources.list.d/google-chrome.list'
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install google-chrome-stable

Ubuntu Tweak

wget -q -O - http://archive.getdeb.net/getdeb-archive.key | sudo apt-key add -
sudo sh -c 'echo "deb http://archive.getdeb.net/ubuntu xenial-getdeb apps" >> /etc/apt/sources.list.d/getdeb.list'
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ubuntu-tweak

UMake

sudo apt-get install python-software-properties
sudo apt-get install software-properties-common

VS Code (via UMake)

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-desktop/ubuntu-make
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ubuntu-make
umake web visual-studio-code

VS Code (via apt)

VS Code enabled official Linux repositories in February 2017 (v1.10):

sudo add-apt-repository -y "deb https://packages.microsoft.com/repos/vscode stable main"
sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys EB3E94ADBE1229CF
sudo apt update
sudo apt -y install code

Upgrade / dist-upgrade as usual:

sudo apt -y upgrade
sudo apt -y dist-upgrade

Fonts

sudo mkdir -p /usr/share/fonts/consolas
sudo cp YaHei.Consolas.1.12.ttf /usr/share/fonts/consolas/
sudo chmod 644 /usr/share/fonts/consolas/YaHei.Consolas.1.12.ttf
cd /usr/share/fonts/consolas
sudo mkfontscale && sudo mkfontdir && sudo fc-cache -fv

NodeJS

curl -sL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_9.x | sudo -E bash -
sudo apt-get install -y nodejs

Git

apt-get install git
sudo apt-get install python-software-properties
sudo apt-get install software-properties-common

Python

sudo apt-get install python-pip

Cleanup

1. Remove leftover config files

Two commands for removing a package on Debian/Ubuntu:

sudo apt-get remove <package-name>
sudo apt-get purge <package-name>

remove deletes the package but keeps its config; purge deletes the config too.

Find packages that still have leftover config:

dpkg --list | grep "^rc"

rc in the first column means the package is Removed but Config-file remains. Extract the names:

dpkg --list | grep "^rc" | cut -d " " -f 3

Delete them:

dpkg --list | grep "^rc" | cut -d " " -f 3 | xargs sudo dpkg --purge

You’ll see something like:

(Reading database ... 64538 files and directories currently installed.)
Removing libapt-inst1.4:amd64 (0.8.16~exp12ubuntu10.11) ...
Purging configuration files for libapt-inst1.4:amd64 (0.8.16~exp12ubuntu10.11) ...
Removing libbind9-80 (1:9.8.1.dfsg.P1-4ubuntu0.6) ...
Purging configuration files for libbind9-80 (1:9.8.1.dfsg.P1-4ubuntu0.6) ...

To purge only one package’s config:

sudo dpkg --purge <package-name>

2. Remove unneeded .deb cache

apt-get install keeps downloaded .deb archives in /var/cache/apt/archives. If you install often, they add up. Check the size:

du -sh /var/cache/apt/archives

Clean them:

sudo apt-get clean
sudo apt-get autoclean

3. Remove orphan packages

apt-get pulls in dependencies automatically. Removing the top-level package leaves those dependencies behind — orphans:

sudo apt-get autoremove

apt-get autoremove only deletes things apt-get itself installed as dependencies. For manually-installed orphans, use deborphan:

sudo apt-get install deborphan

List orphans:

deborphan

Delete them:

deborphan | xargs sudo apt-get purge -y

4. Remove obsolete packages

“Obsolete” means none of the repositories in /etc/apt/sources.list provides this package’s .deb anymore — possibly because upstream is gone, the user base shrank, or the package was renamed. These won’t receive security updates and can break upgrades, so it’s worth clearing them.

Find them:

sudo aptitude search ?obsolete

Example output:

i linux-image-3.2.0-29-generic - Linux kernel image for version 3.2.0 on 64

Delete it:

sudo apt-get purge linux-image-3.2.0-29-generic

Or purge all obsolete packages at once:

sudo aptitude purge ~o

Note: some packages that aren’t in any repo aren’t actually obsolete — e.g. a .deb you downloaded manually like ubuntu-tweak. aptitude purge ~o would catch those too. Prefer hand-picking with apt-get purge.

5. Clear log files

Logs grow over time. Inspect with ncdu:

sudo apt-get install ncdu
sudo ncdu /var/log

Truncate a specific log file:

sudo dd if=/dev/null of=/var/log/shadowsocks.log

6. baobab — disk usage analyzer

A GUI tool to find which directory is eating space:

baobab

Or use ncdu for the user home:

sudo ncdu /home/<username>

ncdu for servers, baobab for desktops.

7. Remove large packages

Install debian-goodies:

sudo apt-get install debian-goodies

List the biggest packages:

dpigs -H

Example output:

441.0M texlive-latex-extra-doc
230.1M valgrind-dbg
200.6M chromium-browser
171.4M google-chrome-stable
153.4M linux-image-extra-3.19.0-39-generic
153.4M linux-image-extra-3.19.0-37-generic
151.5M maltego
144.8M wine1.7-amd64
140.6M metasploit-framework
137.4M wine1.7-i386

Default is top 10; use --lines=20 for more:

dpigs -H --lines=20

8. Use ubuntu-tweak to clean

Download the .deb from the official site, then:

sudo apt-get install gdebi
sudo gdebi ubuntu-tweak*.deb

Open ubuntu-tweak, pick the Janitor tab. From there you can clear app caches, thumbnail caches, apt caches, old kernels, leftover configs, and orphan packages.

Locale

Check the current locale:

locale

Generate / set locales:

sudo locale-gen en_US en_US.UTF-8 en_CA.UTF-8
sudo dpkg-reconfigure locales
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