Essential tools for Ubuntu (and others)
I’m going to keep a list of tools I find essential under Linux. I’m using Ubuntu as my main desktop OS for now but it should apply to any other distro under Gnome. The tools are available in the Ubuntu repositories unless otherwise stated.
Security tools :
Seahorse : encryption keys manager (SSH, GPG) http://www.gnome.org/projects/seahorse/
Truecrypt : transparent volume encryption http://www.truecrypt.org Not available from the repositories
Wipe : Secure file deletion
Revelation : GNOME2 Password manager Revelation is a password manager for the GNOME 2 desktop. It organizes accounts in a tree structure, and stores them as AES-encrypted XML.
GUI stuff :
Glipper : clipboardmanager for GNOME http://glipper.sourceforge.net/
tracker and tracker-search-tool : metadata database, indexer and search tool http://www.gnome.org/projects/tracker/ (now installed by default since Ubuntu 7.10)
nautilus-open-terminal : nautilus plugin for opening terminals in arbitrary local paths
nautilus-image-converter : nautilus extension to mass resize images (this one is a life saver !)
nautilus-gksu : privilege granting extension for nautilus using gksu
nautilus-actions : nautilus extension to configure programs to launch (I personally create a “Securely erase” menu, working with wipe)
cGmail : email notification tool that integrates well with Gnome http://cgmail.tuxfamily.org/index.html Not available from the repositories
Intlclock : enhanced clock applet http://live.gnome.org/GnomePanel/Intlclock Soon to be included in Ubuntu by default
CLI stuff :
Screen : virtual terminal manager http://www.gnu.org/software/screen/
vlock : allows to lock a command-line session (esp. useful for servers)
Multimedia :
EasyTag : viewing, editing and writing ID3 tags http://easytag.sourceforge.net
Documents :
Evince : my favorite PDF reader (default under ubuntu) http://www.gnome.org/projects/evince/
CUPS-PDF : make a virtual printer creating PDF of your documents (apparently installed by default now) http://www.physik.uni-wuerzburg.de/~vrbehr/cups-pdf/
PDFedit : I don’t need to describe this one right http://pdfedit.petricek.net/
Inkscape : vector graphics editor, great for network diagrams http://www.inkscape.org/
Developement stuff :
Vmware Server : virtual machine manager http://www.vmware.com - See this link to install under Ubuntu Ubuntu package name : vmware-server
Internet Explorer : yeah.. need it to see how its funky CSS rendering can destroy a website http://www.tatanka.com.br/ies4linux/ Not in the Ubuntu repositories
Meld : graphical tool to diff and merge files http://meld.sourceforge.net
Colordiff : color your diff outputs
GColor2 : Simple GTK2 color selector and picke http://gcolor2.sourceforge.net/
mysql-query-browser : Official GUI tool to query MySQL database
System stuff :
Filezilla : Port of the famous Win32 graphical FTP client (still in beta, great gftp replacement) http://filezilla.sourceforge.net
ntp support is not installed by default !
tsocks : transparent network access through a SOCKS 4 or 5 proxy for any app http://tsocks.sourceforge.net
sysv-rc-conf : SysV init runlevel configuration tool for the terminal
gstm : Gnome SSH tunnel manager Gnome Secure shell Tunnel Manager is a front-end to manage secure shell tunneled port redirects
Any suggestion welcomed !