Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Get things done with Gnome Do


Gnome Do is a quicklauncher for Linux. Although the name implies it is a Gnome application, it apparently works just as well in XFCE4 or KDE. Similar to the search feature of Opera (which remembers visited websites and content), Do allows you to quickly search for items in your desktop environment and perform useful actions on those items. Do is inspired by Quicksilver and GNOME Launch Box.

You launch Do with Super+Space. Then, if you want to send an email to John, simply type "email john." If you want to listen to Radiohead, type "play radiohead." Also, Do is able to learn from your previous actions. Therefore, if you for example use the Opera web browser often, typing "o" in Do will launch it.

Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy installation instructions:

1. Add the Gnome Do PPA Repository to your sources list.

deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/do-core/ubuntu hardy main
deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/do-core/ubuntu hardy main
2. In Synaptic Package Manager, search for 'gnome-do' or install it from the terminal:
sudo aptitude update && sudo aptitude install gnome-do

More information about this nice, fast, and lightweight application can be found at the Gnome Do wiki.

Tuesday, July 8, 2008

How to change the scrollbar background in Opera 9.50

The scrollbar in Opera is hard to discriminate against its background. One possible option is to increase the contrast by changing the scrollbar background to a darker colour or theme, for example the same background used for the pagebar background. The following steps show how to do it:
  1. As root, open the zip-file containing your current Opera skin. The default skin can be found at /usr/share/opera/skin/standard_skin.zip, while downloaded skins can be found at /home/username/.opera/skin/*.zip.
  2. Inside the zip-file, open the image /backgrounds/pagebar.png with an image editor such as Gimp. 
  3. Rotate the image 90 degrees clockwise and save it as /backgrounds/pagebar2.png inside the zip-file.
  4. Open skin.ini from the zip-file and use Ctrl+F to go to the line containing
    [Scrollbar Vertical Skin]
    Underneath this heading, modify exisiting lines as 
    Type = BoxStretch
    Tile Center = backgrounds/pagebar2.png
  5. You might want to change the horizontal scrollbar background too. Repeat Step 4 but use the original pagebar.png (not rotated). Go to
    [Scrollbar Horizontal Skin]
    Underneath this heading, modify exisiting lines as 
    Type = BoxStretch
    Tile Center = backgrounds/pagebar.png
  6. Save skin.ini inside the zip-file and restart the browser.

The following screenshots shows the scrollbar background before and after the change:

 

You may also be interested in the following posts:

How to change the background of Speed Dial in Opera 9.50

Add more speed dials and remove search field in Opera 9.50