Category: Command Line

How To: Add A PPA To Ubuntu

In this article, we’re going to discuss how to add a PPA to Ubuntu. A PPA is a Personal Package Archive, but we’ve come to use them much differently than they were ever intended. So, you might as well learn how to do this. You might as well learn how to add a PPA to Ubuntu.

Yes, we use PPAs in ways never intended. They are meant to be your own personal archive of packages. not a way of disseminating software to the masses. We’ve turned PPAs into a tool to widely distribute software more easily. If you want a piece of software that’s not in the official repositories, you do a quick search, add a PPA, update, and install your software! It’s how we’ve always done things! (Hint: No, it’s not how we’ve always done things.)

This is one of the main reasons Snap apps were created and why they are being pushed. During this time, people could also have used AppImages and Flatpaks, and some of us did.

Me? I’m among the worst of offenders. As it is, I still only use Snaps that came installed by default. I still reach for a PPA (when available) and install things in the ‘traditional’ manner. Well, it’s hardly traditional and it’s generally a bad idea.

In fact. let me sum up why it’s a bad idea with just one sentence…

When you add a PPA, you’re giving the PPA maintainer root-level access to your computer.

All they gotta do is push an update and you’ll have installed it with your next upgrade. No, don’t pretend you’re going to read the source and verify the integrity. You’re going to do it, just like you wanted to …

Add A PPA To Ubuntu:

Alright, let’s paint a simple picture:

There’s some software you want, but you can’t find it in your repositories and the GitHub page doesn’t release packaged binaries. You don’t want to have to deal with building it every time there’s a new version, so you take to the ‘nets in search of a fix.

Your first stop is at Launchpad.net to search for the application. You got lucky and found a PPA. In fact, you found a few of them. In this case, you want to look for the one who has most consistently published upgrades. First, you have to enable Ubuntu’s ‘universe’ PPA, which may already be enabled. If it isn’t, the command to run is:

When you find the proper repository’s name, you can add it with this command:

An example of that could be sudo add-apt-repository ppa:mozillateam/ppa. You could use that to use the more traditional Firefox. 

No matter… Once you’ve done all this,  you might still need to update your own local software database with this command:

There you have it. You can now add a PPA to Ubuntu. You can now use the software included in the newly added PPA. Modern/current Ubuntu flavors will run the apt update automatically, but older versions will still need to trigger the update manually.

BONUS: You can more easily remove the PPA through the GUI, but you can also do so in the terminal, it’s just the –remove flag, like this;

See? You can now do both. You can add a PPA to Ubuntu or you can remove a PPA from Ubuntu.

Closure:

Ah well… You can now add a PPA to Ubuntu. Removing a PPA is also now something you can do, assuming you didn’t already do so. On top of that, adding PPAs willy-nilly as  you’re essentially giving that PPA’s owner a key to your entire computer.

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How To: Check A Disk For Errors

In today’s article, we’re going to learn how to check a disk for errors. We’ll be using a multi-pronged process to thoroughly check a disk for errors in the Linux terminal. By itself, none of these are particularly complicated. As such, I expect this to be a relatively easy article to follow.

If you’ve been seeing errors when transferring data to a disk, it’s probably a good sign that it’s time to check that disk for errors. You may also want to check a disk for errors if you’ve not used it before – like if it is used or if you have just purchased it.

To perform these tests, the disk must not be mounted! If need be, you’ll have to do these tests from a live environment. That’s easy enough. Remember how you installed Linux? Well, that same installation media is (usually) the same media you’ll need to enter a live environment. You will, of course, need to boot to the media when you start your system – be it USB, or CD, or DVD. It’s much the same as though you were going to install Linux – except you don’t opt to do the installation – you just work in the live environment.

Anyhow, we’ll be using a few tools for this. All of these tools will almost certainly be available by default. If they’re not, ummm… Well, if they’re not, pick a different distro’s live environment to use, or install them yourself! These tools are all on the installation media for distros in the Ubuntu family, for example. So, yeah, find a distro where they are available – which should be pretty much all of them.

Check A Disk For Errors:

So, you’re booted to a live instance of your favorite distro (or the disk you’re going to check is unmounted) and you’re ready to start testing. Well, you need an open terminal. If you don’t know how to open the terminal, you can do so with your keyboard – just press CTRL + ALT + T and your default terminal should open.

Once you have your terminal open, use lsblk to identify the disk you wish to check for errors. For the purposes of this exercise, we’re going to assume the disk you’re checking for errors is known as ‘sda’. Be sure to change that to suit your particular needs.

First, let’s check for S.M.A.R.T. errors (which we’ve previously covered in-depth). You can do so with this command:

Next, let’s check for bad blocks. Bad blocks are physical points on your device that no longer work properly. Some bad blocks isn’t, necessarily, indicative of immediate disk failure. Some bad blocks may be normal. Still, let’s check it.

If you’re really into this, you’ll want to check it for bad blocks – and then check it again soon after. That will let you know if the number of bad blocks is increasing. If the number is rapidly increasing, disk failure will likely soon follow. Otherwise, you’re probably okay for the time being.

Finally, let’s check for file-system consistency. This is typically done with the ‘fsck’ command, a command you should have some understanding of. There are many ways to run the command, but you can just use the following command to see what’s going on:

Now, you’ve run three tests. Between them all, you should have a pretty good understanding of your disk’s health and you’ll know how to check a disk for errors. Again, you’ll want to check a disk for errors when the situation dictates – especially if you’re getting disk errors while in the operating system. 

When you get disk errors, it’s time to consider retiring the drive. Depending on the severity of the errors, you might wish to stop using the drive immediately, creating an image of the drive, and retiring the drive from your system. Disk failures happen and recovering data from a failed drive can be a major hassle. So, use these warnings as a reason to consider replacing your drives if drive failure is in the cards.

Closure:

And there you have it! You now know how to check a disk for errors! It’s a handy skill to have. After all, disks fail. Knowing when they are going to fail is a good thing. Being prepared for disk failure is a bonus and a good idea! It’s also worth checking new disks. I’ve tested new disks and had unsatisfactory results that meant I returned the disk to the retailer, so it’s a concern and worth taking the time to test.

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Let’s Zip A Directory In The Linux Terminal

Today, we’re going to zip a directory in the Linux terminal. This isn’t a very complicated task, but it’s worth covering. It’s also not something you’re likely to do every day, but it’s bound to be useful to some of you. You’re eventually going to want to share a directory’s worth of files with someone!

Why zip a directory? This is Linux, we deal with .tar.gz!

Well, in the real world, you might just want to share files with other people. They’ll have no idea what to do with a .tar.gz file – but they’ll know exactly what to do with a .zip file.

More importantly, pretty much every operating system on the planet can open a .zip file. Even way back with the Amiga and Atari systems, you were able  to open .zip files.

As an added bonus, you probably already have the utility to compress files into .zip files and won’t need to install anything! So, you won’t need to install anything and you’ll be able to share the resulting files with pretty much anyone on the planet. What’s not to love?

Heck, you don’t even need to install an application on Windows or MacOS to open .zip files. As a quick test, I can even open them with a file management application on Android. I’m not sure if Android also deals with them by default or if it’s a function of the file manager. Still, you can open .zip files just fine on Android.

With all those great things, you might just as well learn how to zip a directory in the Linux terminal. I promise, it’s really easy.

Zip A Directory:

This article requires an open terminal, like many other articles on this site. If you don’t know how to open the terminal, you can do so with your keyboard – just press CTRL + ALT + T and your default terminal should open.

Chances are very good that you won’t have to install ‘zip’ to get this to work. You can find out quickly enough by just typing:

That’ll likely tell you which zip and where it’s located. If not, you’ll need to install it from your default repositories. I expect very few people will need to do that.

Now to zip a directory…

You can also zip a directory recursively, by using the ‘r’ flag:

This is not to be confused with the R flag, which will recursively compress the files in the folder – but only those files that were specified, such as from this example command in the man page:

That’d take all the files in the current directory that ended in ‘.c’ and compress them into a file called foo. That’s not really what we’re after, nor is it what the article is about. Either way, while you’re exploring, be sure to check the man page. This is one of the biggest man pages you’ll likely come across and there are a ton of options beyond just simply letting you zip a directory.

Closure:

There you have it. You can now zip a directory – such as a directory of pictures to share with your loved ones who are still not using Linux. It’s not terribly difficult, but it’s a useful skill to have and you never know when you’ll want to share a bunch of files with other people.

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How To: Extract An .rar File

Today, we’re going to learn how to extract an .rar file in Linux. You don’t see .rar files all that often with Linux, but sometimes they crop up. Today’s article will explain how to extract them.

You may recall .rar files from your Windows days, assuming you have a history with Windows – as many of us Linux users do. You’d probably be most familiar with the application known as ‘WinRAR‘. 

While the application is specifically for Windows (there’s a text-based WinRAR for Linux, perhaps a subject for another article), it produces files compressed with the .rar format. The .rar compression is much like any other compression, from .tar.gz to .zip. At some point, you may be faced with opening one while you’re using Linux.

Just because the files are often made with WinRAR doesn’t mean the files will only be opened in Windows. Once in a while, you’ll find something you need that’s in .rar format and you’re using Linux. Well, fear not, you can extract an .rar file easily enough. It’s just a simple terminal command away and you should be all set. While not a skill you’ll need often, it’s one you’ll maybe need and now is a good enough time to learn how.

Extract An .RAR File:

This article requires an open terminal, like many other articles on this site. If you don’t know how to open the terminal, you can do so with your keyboard – just press CTRL + ALT + T and your default terminal should open.

Once you have the terminal open, you’ll need to install an application called ‘unrar’. If you’re using a major distro, it’s likely in your repository – though maybe under the name of ‘unrar-nonfree’. Search your repositories and you’ll find it.

If you’re using Debian/Ubuntu/similar then it’s easy enough – it’s called ‘unrar’ and you install it with:

With that installed, the next part is really quite easy:

That will extract the contents of the .rar file while preserving paths. If you don’t care about that sort of result, just use the ‘e’ flag like this (and it’ll extract everything to the current directory):

You can also extract password protected content easily enough, just read the man pages with man unrar to learn how. Anything you can do with a GUI you can do with the terminal. You just need to read the man page. This article only covers how to extract an .rar file without any complexity.

Closure:

That’s it. That’s today’s article. The goal was to learn how to extract an .rar file in Linux and now you know how to do so with unrar and the Linux terminal. ‘Snot all that complicated, really.

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Change Your Hostname

In today’s article, we’re going to learn how to change your hostname in Linux. It’s a pretty easy article to follow along with, so even if you’re a beginner you can follow along. If you’re an advanced user, you probably already know how to do this. If not,  you will now.

So, what is your hostname? Basically, it’s the name of your computer (generally speaking). You login as <your_username> to a computer referred to by its <hostname>. So, in this case, I’m currently kgiii@kgiii-lmde. The ‘kgiii-lmde’ is the hostname. When you open your terminal, in all likelihood it shows you the <user>@<hostname> at the start of your regular prompt.

You can do some neat stuff with the hostname. For instance, and depending on the distro, it’s often local or localhost, you can connect to your LAN devices (without knowing the IP address) by connecting to <hostname>.local. This is handy for using SSH around the house, or even for using FTP or whatever.

If you don’t know your hostname, you can use one of the following commands to figure it out:

Or you can try:

There are other ways to show the hostname, but those two should be enough to get you sorted out. Either of them will happily spit out the hostname. Now that you know your hostname, it’s time to learn how to …

Change Your Hostname:

Like so many other articles on this site, this one requires an open terminal to continue. So, just press CTRL + ALT + T and your default terminal should open.

With your terminal open, enter the following command:

That should permanently change your hostname to the new hostname you chose to use in the command. You can actually change it temporarily, it will not be persistent between reboots, with the hostname command. to do that you’d just sudo hostname <new_hostname> and it’ll change it for the current session only.

To verify that you’ve changed your hostname, run one of the commands listed in the preamble section of this article. (Just type hostname and to verify you know how to change your hostname.)

Anyhow, that’s all there is to it. You really don’t need anything more than that if you want to change your hostname in Linux. Anyone should be able to follow the few directions needed.

Closure:

There you have it, another article. To think, we’re over 200 articles now. This is just one more among many, and this one is easy enough to follow. If you ever wanted to change your hostname, now you know…

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