24 Best Things to do After Installing Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

Undoubtedly Ubuntu operating system has become one of the most popular Linux Distribution among the Linux users. Also, it has a large community of developers and users. However, there are numerous websites on the internet filled with tutorials, Q&A, Documentation etc. on Ubuntu OS. In addition to above plenty of help material is available for Ubuntu OS on the internet. Recently, at the time of writing this post Conical has released the latest LTS (long term support) version 20.04 of Ubuntu. Ubuntu 20.04 is code named Focal Fossa and is a successor to Ubuntu 19.10, code named Eoan Ermine. In this blog post I will show you 24 Best Things to do After Installing Ubuntu 20.04 LTS Focal Fossa.

Furthermore, when you install any operating system on your computer, the next thing that comes to your mind is what to do now? How to configure your new operating system?  How to get the most out of your new operating system? The same questions arise before you after installing your new Ubuntu 20.04 LTS operating system.

However, for every user the requirements from the operating system are different according to the nature of their job. Here I will try to cover everything that you can do after installing Ubuntu 20.04 on your new machine. Moreover, right from updates to various applications that will help you extract the most out of the new Operating System. Select the settings, tweaks and applications according to your requirements from the below given list of settings, tweaks and application.

1. Install Latest Update

However, a system update message is frequently displayed on the screen, after the completion of the installation of Ubuntu 20.04 LTS. Additionally, you can update your newly installed Ubuntu OS by allowing the system updater to update your system automatically.

Always keep your system updated to avoid bugs or errors in the OS. However, updating your system regularly increases the performance of your system. Always update your system and use the latest version of software. Moreover, the large community base of Ubuntu regularly releases the important updates for us. Mostly Ubuntu sends the push notification of important updates on your system.

Additionally, you can run the Software Updater in Ubuntu to update your system manually as and when needed. A screenshot of the Software Updater is given below.

Additionally, you can also manually update your system from the terminal window using the following command.

sudo apt-get update && apt-get upgrade –y

2. Enable Other Software Repositories

All the Ubuntu releases have their own built in repositories for updates. In addition to this there are other repositories also for more software and system drivers update. However, these repositories may not be enabled by default in the fresh installation of Ubuntu 20.04.  To enable these repositories you can navigate to the Software and Updates and from there you can enable the required repositories. After enabling the other repositories update your system again.

To enable the other software repositories that are not enabled by default in Ubuntu check mark the repositories in Software and Update option as shown in the below given screenshot.

Furthermore, for installation of other software select the relevant option in Software and Updates as shown in the screenshot below.

Furthermore, to check and install additional or missing drivers select the Additional Drivers menu in the Software and Update.

3. Remove System Crash Notification

However, sometimes we see some system notifications showing that our system is crashed and this has to be reported to Conical. Also, this notification pops up again and again and becomes irritating. Therefore, to overcome this problem, remove the Apport package from the system. However, to get rid of this problem, issue following command to in the terminal window.

sudo apt-get remove apport apport-gtk

4. Install and Configure UFW Firewall

However, UFW Firewall is installed by default with Ubuntu installation. If it is not installed on your system then issue the following command in the terminal window to install it.

sudo apt install ufw

To check the status of UFW issue the following command in the terminal window.

sudo ufw status verbose

Show list of the application profiles on your machine, issue the following command in the terminal window.

sudo ufw app list

To enable and disable UFW issue the following command.

sudo ufw enable

sudo ufw disable

To allow a service or a port through ufw issue the following command.

sudo ufw allow http

sudo ufw allow 80/tcp

5. Install GNOME Tweak Tool on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

GNOME Tweak Tool is an application tool to customise Ubuntu according to our liking. For example we can easily customise the global font size, colours, background, startup applications, and so on. Additionally, using this tool you can change the whole look and feel of the Ubuntu desktop Environment as per your requirement. To install GNOME Tweak Tool on your system issue the following command in the terminal window.

sudo apt-get install gnome-tweak-tool

6. Install GNOME Shell Extensions on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

You can add animations, new fonts, background images, themes and much more to the Ubuntu desktop Environment. Moreover, this is possible through the GNOME Shell Extension.

Next, open your favorite browser and navigate to the given below link and you will find lots of interesting extensions.

7. Install Synaptic Package Manager

Synaptic Package Manager is an alternative to Ubuntu Software Center. It is a simple and easy to use software package installer. Synaptic Package Manager can be directly downloaded and installed from command line or from the Ubuntu Software Center. Given below is the screen shot of the Ubuntu Software Center and the Command Line statement for installation.

sudo apt-get install synaptic

8. Install Snap Store in Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

 Snap Store is a graphical application for installing and managing Linux applications. It is promoted by Conical the developers of Ubuntu itself. Snap Store can be installed from the Ubuntu Software Center. You can follow our detailed guide on installing and using Snap Store. Given below is the link of the guide.

Given below is the command line for installing Snap Store on your system.

sudo snap install snap-store

9. Install Flatpak on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

Flatpak is a repository of software tools like Snap Store. The difference is that the Snap Store is backed by Conical the developers of Ubuntu and Flatpak is backed by Redhat the developers of Fedora and CentOS. One main difference is that packages on Snap Store do not have their dependencies but on Flatpak does have all the dependency packages along with the main application. Therefore applications on Flatpak can run on any Linux distribution. Flatpak installer is a part of Ubuntu repository. We can install Flatpak by issuing the following command in the terminal window.

sudo apt-get install flatpak

Now install GNOME Software plugin for flatpak to integrate Flatpak with Software Center. Issue the following command in the terminal Window to do this.

sudo apt-get install gnome-software-plugin-flatpak

Now to add Flathub repository issue the following command in the terminal window.

flatpak remote-add –if-not-exists flathub https://flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpak

To add the Fedora Flatpak repository run the following command.

flatpak remote-add --if-not-exists fedora oci+https://registry.fedoraproject.org

10. Improve Laptop Battery Performance

If you are using Laptop, then you can reduce the battery consumption on Ubuntu. To increase the battery performance, install Laptop Power Management Tool (TLP) on your system. It runs in background and reduces the battery consumption. To install issue the following command in the terminal window.

sudo apt-get install tlp tlp-rdw

sudo systemctl enable tlp

11. Enable Night Light Mode in Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

There is a night light mode in Ubuntu to protect the eyes of the users. To enable the night light mode navigate to the below given menu path and turn on the night light mode.

Settings  -> Devices -> Night Light

12. Install Multimedia Codecs in Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

All the multimedia codecs are not installed in Ubuntu 20.04 by default. It is important to have multimedia codecs on your operating system to be able to play multimedia files. The Ubuntu restricted extras also installs Microsoft Core Fonts for Ubuntu.

Multimedia codecs can be installed on Ubuntu 20.04 by issuing the following command in the terminal window.

sudo apt-get install ubuntu-restricted-extras

13. Install Microsoft Fonts on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

Microsoft fonts can be installed in Ubuntu and most of the other Linux distributions. If you have not installed the Ubuntu restricted extras which also installs the Microsoft core fonts then you can separately install Microsoft True-type fonts by issuing the following command in the terminal window.

sudo apt-get install ttf-mscorefonts-installer

14. Install Gdebi package Installer in Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

Gdebi is a lightweight and default package installer in Ubuntu 20.04. It is very useful when there is some errors in installing some third party packages through software center. Issue the following command in the terminal window to install Gdebi package manager on your system.

sudo apt-get install gdebi

15. Install Google Chrome Browser in Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

Google Chrome is one of the most popular browsers. To download and install Chrome browser in Ubuntu, go to the Google Chrome download page and download the .deb installer file as shown in below given screenshot.

The downloaded files name will be like this “google-chrome-stable_current_amd64.deb”.

Now you can install this .deb file through software center or through the command line using the gdebi package manager. Below given is the Gdebi command line for Chrome browser installation.

sudo gdebi google-chrome-stable_current_amd64.deb

16. Install vlc media player on Ubuntu 20.04

A media player application is necessary for a desktop system. VLC media player is one of the most popular media players. It supports most of the media formats. It is in the default repository of Ubuntu 20.04. We can install vlc media player with the apt command of Ubuntu 20.04. However, we can also install vlc media player from the snap store. We can install vlc media player from the Software Center. Given below is the terminal command for the installation of vlc.

sudo apt-get install vlc
sudo snap install vlc

17. Install Ubuntu Cleaner on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

Although, there are limited system optimisation tools available for Linux. Apart from Bleachbit System Cleaner, Ubuntu Cleaner is also a popular choice among the users. Below given is the screenshot of the Ubuntu Cleaner for your reference.

To install Ubuntu Cleaner on your system, issue the following commands in the terminal windows as given below.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gerardpuig/ppa
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install ubuntu-cleaner

18. Install Atom Text Editor for Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

Atom is a versatile text editor. You can do your day to day work as well as your most of the programming job on this editor. The supported programming languages are C, C++, HTML, JavaScript, PHP etc. You can install Atom text editor from the Snap Store by issuing the following command in the terminal window.

$ sudo snap install atom –classic

19. Install Visual Studio Code on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

Visual Studio Code or vscode is another powerful text editor from Microsoft Corporation. However, vscode is used for text file creation and for programming in C, C++, HTML, JavaScript etc. We can install Visual Studio Code Editor from the Snap Store. To install it issue the following command in the terminal window.

sudo snap install --classic code

20. Install GIMP Multimedia Editor on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

GIMP is free and open source multimedia editor. It has a large community of developers. It is one of the most popular open source editor. GIMP package is in the default repository of Ubuntu 20.04. Issue the apt command of Ubuntu 20.04 to install GIMP Editor.

apt-get install gimp

21. Simple Screen Recorder for Ubuntu 20.04

Simple Screen Recorder is as the name suggests is a simple and easy to use desktop screen recorder. It supports many different audio and video formats. This software package is part of the Ubuntu 20.04 default repository. To install issue the following command in the terminal window as shown below.

sudo apt-get install simplescreenrecorder

22. Install Play on Linux on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

For those users who are from the windows background and want to use some windows application on Linux, Play on Linux is the solution. However, it is a graphical interface for installing Windows applications. For example some versions of ms office, windows based compression software, media players etc. on Ubuntu Linux. Play on Linux is part of the default repository of Ubuntu 20.04. Additionally, We can install Play on Linux through Software center. Issue the following command in the terminal window to install Play on Linux.

sudo apt-get install playonlinux

23. Install Skype on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

Skype is a messaging and video calling application. It also supports voice calling over the internet. You can install Skype from the Snap Store by issuing the following command in the terminal window.

sudo snap install skype

24. Install OpenShot Video Editor on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

OpenShot Video editor as the name suggests is a powerful video editing tool. It is an open source and freely available application. OpenShot Video Editor package is the part of the default Ubuntu 20.04 repository. Issue the following command to install it.

sudo apt-get install openshot

Conclusion

In addition to above there are number of application available for almost everything for Ubuntu 20.04. The above discussed application are some of the more popular application. List of some more important application.

• Disk Management Application – Gparted
• Disk Cleaning Application – Bleachbit
• System Optimization Application – Stacer
• Pitivi Multimedia Editor
• Lightworks Multimedia Editor
• Audacity Multimedia Editor

The list is long, and endless. Just Google search and you will find many alternatives for all the applications. This completes the article “24 Best Things to do After Installing Ubuntu 20.04 LTS Focal Fossa”.