Create a Custom Keyboard Shortcut

Very quick and simple bit of advice on how to create custom keyboard shortcuts.

1. Menu -> Keyboard

2. Go to the Shortcuts tab.

Then you can create custom shortcuts for more or less every aspect of uBuntu.

My personal favourite is to set shortcuts for each workspace to allow me to flick back and forth between different tasks quickly. As you can see below they're set so CTRL+1 takes me to workspace 1, CTRL+2 takes me to 2 and so forth.

Make Icon Sizes Specific to Folders

Recently I've found that I've wanted to change the default icon size in one specific folder purely for aesthetic reasons (I have custom icons that I want to see full size every time).

Unfortunately I've not been able to do it in Nautilus as when you change the default size... it changes it universally, not just for the one folder which is what I want.

The good news is it does work in Nemo, an alternative file browser which is available from the software centre.

Or in terminal:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gwendal-lebihan-dev/cinnamon-stable
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install nemo

Even if you're not interested in folder specific icon sizes, I've always found its helpful to have a secondary browser just in case.

Block Website Using Hosts in uBuntu

If you’ve ever wanted to block a website more comprehensively than a Firefox add on then this might be for you.

1. Hit Alt + F2 to bring up Run.

2. Type the command:

gksu gedit /etc/hosts

3. To block the website add 127.0.0.1 then the website. Tab to create the space, if you were wondering.

127.0.0.1 facebook.com

127.0.0.1 http://www.facebook.com

4. Save and you’re done. Obviously, you can always go back and remove those lines if you want to use those sites again.

Change Hostname on uBuntu - Quick & Easy

Here's a quick and simple four step guide to changing your computers hostname on uBuntu.

1. In the terminal enter:  

sudo gedit /etc/hostname  

2. The file should be an empty text file. Save the file with the hostname you'd like to set.

3. In the terminal enter:  

sudo /etc/init.d/hostname.sh start  

4. Reboot.

Rename Files in Bulk uBuntu

Short and sweet tutorial to install a mass-renaming tool with a GUI.

1. sudo apt-get install gprename

2. gprename

This should open the gprename GUI where you'll be able to scroll to your folder then rename as many files as you want within seconds.

How to install a Tar.gz file (or Tar.bz2 file) Easily

1. Extract your file into a folder such as your documents.

2. Read the Install text or Readme to see if there are any specific instructions or requirements for your package.

3. Make that directory your central directory using the cd command in the terminal.

For example, for one extracted in your documents.

cd /home/username/Documents/YourExtract

4. Run command: ./configure 

This should also tell you if there are any dependencies which are required to be installed.

5. Run command: make 

6. Run command: sudo make install

Find a File by its Contents (uBuntu Contents Search)

So you can find a file by it's name pretty easily using Nautilus but how do you search for it's contents?

Enter the following code in the terminal:

grep -lir "search text" /path/to/directory

And it'll return a list of files containing your search terms within them.