[To do] Things to do after installing ArchLinux

Things to do after installing ArchLinux

My main system is running Arch for the moment and I am loving it.

I decided to make this post a little different from the previous ones, because if you have installed Arch you have a good knowledge of Linux.

If you plan to install Arch

The installation of ArchLinux is not an easy thing. You can check this two guides that I followed to have an idea of what you will need to do.

Beginners' Guide - ArchWiki

Build a Killer Customized Arch Linux Installation - LifeHacker

You may want to try it in a different machine because you may not be able to make everything run the first try.

Why would I want to install Arch?

Random motivation meme

The idea behind Arch is to have a lightweight distribution that receives always the latests updates. So you will always run the latests kernels and the latests versions of everything.

Many users like ArchLinux because you do almost everything from scratch. You create your partitions and choose your filesystem, you enable your network...

I have been an Ubuntu user since I started using Linux, I have tried other distros but I wasn't fully satisfied with them. With Arch it has been different because I feel like I own the OS. I build it the way I like it and that feels actually great.

My desktop in Arch

Installing software, adding packages, using the Wiki

The two tutorials that I mentioned will allow you to install a very basic installation. But let's be honest the only thing you need to get everything you want, is a Terminal emulator.

In ArchLinux you will have to install new software using pacman it's very easy actually.

If you want to install something you only need to run

sudo pacman -S <package_name>

If you want to search for a package

sudo pacman -Ss <package_name>

If you want to remove a package

sudo pacman -R <package_name>

And if you want to update your system

sudo pacman -Syu

What I recommend you to do before starting installing everything that you want is to enable multilib repositories.

Go ahead and edit the pacman configuration file in /etc/pacman.conf

Uncomment the lines

[multilib]
Include = /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist

The ArchWiki is your best friend while you are using Arch. If you want some information about how to install a package you can search information in the ArchWiki about Bumblebee for example, it will tell you how to install it and test it.

What is great about the ArchWiki is that it applies most of the time for Linux in general. It's a great source of documentation.

If you want a list of software you may want to install, you can check my posts about Top Things to Do for any distro.

For Ubuntu 13.04 for example:

Top things to do after installing Ubuntu 13.04

Using the AUR

If you don't find the program that you want in the repositories the easiest way to install what you want is to download a tarball from the Arch User Repositories (AUR) build the package and install it using pacman. It sounds very complicated but you get used to doing this.

The really first time you do this you need to install basic development tools:

sudo pacman -S base-devel

First search for the package that you want in the AUR website and download the tarball. Then you need to extract it:

tar xvf <the_tarball>.tar.gz

Go to the extracted directory and run makepkg, the -s option is used to install dependencies

makepkg -s

This will build the package and create a .tar.xz and the last step is to install that build with pacman

sudo pacman -U <the_build>.tar.xz

Some notes about problems I have encountered

I use a Broadcom Wireless device and I have to use the broadcom-wl package from the AUR. My interface gets renamed from time to time and NetworkManager isn't able to connect. I haven't figured out what is causing the problem yet. :(

EDIT (02/09/13): My problem with Network Manager and with the weird interface name was caused by a systemd service. In the wiki it tells you to enable dhcpd service if you don't have a network connection. I had to do it and that basically caused my wireless interface to have weird names like "eth0".
If you have that problem you need to disable dhcpd with

sudo systemctl disable dhcpd.service

If you enabled or installed another service, in my case netctl make sure you uninstall it in order to use Network Manager.

Then simply start Network Manager with:

sudo systemctl enable NetworkManager
sudo systemctl start NetworkManager

If you need a 3G connection install Modem Manager and enable it:

sudo systemctl enable ModemManager
sudo systemctl start ModemManager

Looking good Arch

When I was trying to install Steam I had a gpg signature problem what solved my problem was running the following commands:

sudo pacman-key --refresh-keys
sudo gpg --homedir /etc/pacman.d/gnupg --edit-key 182ADEA0 enable quit

Make sure you check the ArchWiki post about Steam. You may need some libraries , I needed the package lib32-intel-dri in order to fix performance issues.

If you use Bumblebee I recommend you to launch steam with primusrun:

primusrun steam

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[Tutorial] Mejorar el rendimiento de su batería en Linux

Mejorar el rendimiento de su batería en Linux

Si quieren mejorar le rendimiento de su batería en Linux y quieren reemplazar a Jupiter porque ya no está siendo mantenido pueden darle un vistazo a TLP.

En este post les motraré algunas funcionalidades de TLP y como pueden instalarlo en varias distribuciones.

Nota: Solo tengo dos computadores, uno en Ubuntu y otro con Fedora. No he probado TLP en openSUSE.

Funcionalidades de TLP

TLP es un programa que no tiene ninguna interfaz gráfica y automática ejecuta algunas rutinas para funcionar. Así que prepárense para lanzar uno que otro Terminal.

Estas son las funcionalidades, sacadas del sitio oficial de TLP (en inglés):

Settings depending on the Power Source

• Kernel laptop mode and dirty buffer timeouts
• Processor frequency scaling including "turbo boost" / "turbo core"
• Power aware process scheduler for multi-core/hyper-threading
• Hard disk advanced power magement level and spin down timeout (per disk)
• SATA aggressive link power management (ALPM)
• PCI Express active state power management (PCIe ASPM) – Linux 2.6.35 and above
• Runtime power management for PCI(e) bus devices – Linux 2.6.35 and above
• Radeon KMS power management – Linux 2.6.35 and above, not fglrx
• Wifi power saving mode – depending on kernel/driver
• Power off optical drive in drive bay (on battery)

Additional functions

• I/O scheduler (per disk)
• USB autosuspend with blacklist
• Audio power saving mode – hda_intel, ac97
• Enable or disable integrated wifi, bluetooth or wwan devices upon system startup and shutdown
• Restore radio device state on system startup (from previous shutdown).
• Radio device wizard: switch radios upon network connect/disconnect and dock/undock
• Disable Wake On LAN
• WWAN state is restored after suspend/hibernate
• Untervolting of Intel processors – requires kernel with PHC-Patch
• Battery charge thresholds – ThinkPads only
• Recalibrate battery – ThinkPads only

 

Instalar TLP

Bueno he aquí la parte interesante. Si quieren usar TLP deberán eliminar scripts que hayan hecho o instalado para tratar de mejorar el rendimiento de su batería. Como TLP funciona muy cerca del Kernel puede que funcione mal si tengan rutinas que interfieran con TLP.

En Ubuntu

Solo añadan el PPA oficial:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:linrunner/tlp
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install tlp tlp-rdw

Si usan un Thinkpad

sudo apt-get install tp-smapi-dkms acpi-call-tool

En Fedora

sudo yum localinstall --nogpgcheck http://repo.linrunner.de/fedora/tlp/repos/releases/tlp-release-1.0-0.noarch.rpm

sudo yum localinstall --nogpgcheck http://download1.rpmfusion.org/free/fedora/rpmfusion-free-release-stable.noarch.rpm

Instalen los paquetes que necesiten:

• tlp (TLP repo) – Economizar energía
• tlp-rdw (TLP repo) – opcional, Radio Device Wizard
• akmod-tp_smapi (TLP repo) – opcional solo ThinkPad, tp-smapi se necesita para calibrar la batería de algunos Thinkpad que usan tlp-stat
• akmod-acpi_call (TLP repo) – opcional solo ThinkPad, acpi-call se necesita para calibrar la batería de algunos modelos con Sandy Bridge y con otros modelos más recientes (X220/T420, X230/T430 et al.)

Instalen los paquetes con el comando siguiente:

sudo yum -y install tlp tlp-rdw 

Thinkpads requieren:

sudo yum -y install akmod-tp_smapi akmod-acpi_call

En OpenSUSE 12.3

zypper ar -f http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/cdersch:/TLP/openSUSE_12.3/home:cdersch:TLP.repo 

En caso de los repositorios contrib no estén activos:

zypper ar -f http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/openSUSE:/Factory:/Contrib/openSUSE_12.3/openSUSE:Factory:Contrib.repo

Verificar que TLP está funcionando

Para ejecutar TLP manualmente necesitan usar

sudo tlp start

Pueden verificar que TLP está activo en cualquier momento con

sudo tlp stat

Y si quieren ser más específicos

sudo tlp stat | grep "TLP_ENABLE"

o también

sudo tlp stat | grep "TLP power save"

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[How to] Improve Battery Life in Linux

How to improve battery performance in Linux

If you want to improve your battery life in Linux and you want to replace Jupiter because it is no longer maintained, you can check out TLP.

In this post I will show you some features of TLP and how to install it in different distros.

Note: I only have two computers, one with Ubuntu and another with Fedora. I haven't try this in openSUSE.

TLP features

"TLP is a pure command line tool with automated background tasks". So be prepare to launch a Terminal.

Here are the features showed in the TLP official site:

Settings depending on the Power Source

• Kernel laptop mode and dirty buffer timeouts
• Processor frequency scaling including "turbo boost" / "turbo core"
• Power aware process scheduler for multi-core/hyper-threading
• Hard disk advanced power magement level and spin down timeout (per disk)
• SATA aggressive link power management (ALPM)
• PCI Express active state power management (PCIe ASPM) – Linux 2.6.35 and above
• Runtime power management for PCI(e) bus devices – Linux 2.6.35 and above
• Radeon KMS power management – Linux 2.6.35 and above, not fglrx
• Wifi power saving mode – depending on kernel/driver
• Power off optical drive in drive bay (on battery)

Additional functions

• I/O scheduler (per disk)
• USB autosuspend with blacklist
• Audio power saving mode – hda_intel, ac97
• Enable or disable integrated wifi, bluetooth or wwan devices upon system startup and shutdown
• Restore radio device state on system startup (from previous shutdown).
• Radio device wizard: switch radios upon network connect/disconnect and dock/undock
• Disable Wake On LAN
• WWAN state is restored after suspend/hibernate
• Untervolting of Intel processors – requires kernel with PHC-Patch
• Battery charge thresholds – ThinkPads only
• Recalibrate battery – ThinkPads only

Installing TLP

Now the serious part. If you want to use TLP you need to erase all kind of power configuration you may have done or scripts you may have implement.

In Ubuntu

Just add the official PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:linrunner/tlp
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install tlp tlp-rdw

If you use a Thinkpad

sudo apt-get install tp-smapi-dkms acpi-call-tool

In Fedora

sudo yum localinstall --nogpgcheck http://repo.linrunner.de/fedora/tlp/repos/releases/tlp-release-1.0-0.noarch.rpm

sudo yum localinstall --nogpgcheck http://download1.rpmfusion.org/free/fedora/rpmfusion-free-release-stable.noarch.rpm

Install the following packages:

• tlp (TLP repo) – Power saving
• tlp-rdw (TLP repo) – optional, Radio Device Wizard
• akmod-tp_smapi (TLP repo) – optional ThinkPad only, tp-smapi is needed for battery charge thresholds and ThinkPad specific status output of tlp-stat
• akmod-acpi_call (TLP repo) – optional ThinkPad only, acpi-call is needed for battery charge thresholds on Sandy Bridge and newer models (X220/T420, X230/T430 et al.)

Install the above packages with the following command:

sudo yum -y install tlp tlp-rdw 

ThinkPads require an additional:

sudo yum -y install akmod-tp_smapi akmod-acpi_call

In OpenSUSE 12.3

zypper ar -f http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/cdersch:/TLP/openSUSE_12.3/home:cdersch:TLP.repo 

In case the contrib repo is not yet active:

zypper ar -f http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/openSUSE:/Factory:/Contrib/openSUSE_12.3/openSUSE:Factory:Contrib.repo

Checking if TLP is running

If you want to manually start tlp run the command

sudo tlp start

You can check if tlp is enabled at any moment with

sudo tlp stat

If you want to be more specific

sudo tlp stat | grep "TLP_ENABLE"

or you can check

sudo tlp stat | grep "TLP power save"

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[Tutorial] ¿Qué hacer luego de instalar Fedora 19?

¿Qué hacer luego de instalar Fedora 19?

What is he talking about? English version

Ok, instalé Fedora. ¿Qué hago ahora?

En este post les mostraré lo que les recomiendo hacer/instalar para hacer que su computador tenga todas las funcionalidades que necesitan.

Antes de comenzar les recomiendo mucho el uso de un Terminal. Excepto cuando les diga que abran "Software Update" por ejemplo.

Actualizar los paquetes e instalar todas las actualizaciones

Definitivamente lo que uno debe hacer apenas instala Fedora es actualizar los paquetes e instalar las actualizaciones. Para eso vamos a buscar el "Software Update" en la lista de programas.

Las actualizaciones se van a cargar y podrán instalarlas luego.

O también podemos lanzar un Terminal y ejecutamos el comando siguiente:

sudo yum -y update

Para la primera instalación esto puede tomar bastante tiempo.

Instalar los drivers propietarios

Cartas gráficas: Si su computador utiliza cartas gráficas nVidia, necesitan instalar los paquetes en sus repositorios, pero antes hay que verificar qué tipo de carta gráfica utilizan. Primero verifiquen sus componentes:

lspci | grep -i VGA

Esto les debe dar dos líneas. Una es el GPU de su procesador y la otra es la tarjeta gráfica nVidia.

Si tienen una tarjeta gráfica con Tecnología Optimus usen:

lspci | grep -i 3D

Necesitaran instalar Bumblebee en este caso, para eso vayan a esta página.

Añadan los repositorios RPMFusion. Instalen los paquetes libres y los no libres:

sudo yum localinstall --nogpgcheck http://download1.rpmfusion.org/free/fedora/rpmfusion-free-release-19.noarch.rpm

sudo yum localinstall --nogpgcheck http://download1.rpmfusion.org/nonfree/fedora/rpmfusion-nonfree-release-19.noarch.rpm

Luego instalen los drivers:

sudo yum install akmod-nvidia xorg-x11-drv-nvidia-libs

Codecs multimedia

Necesitan añadir los respositorios RPMFusion para instalar algunas cosas de lo que sigue del tutorial.

Aquí están los paquetes que pueden necesitar (instalen solo lo que piensen que sea necesario):

sudo yum -y install gstreamer-plugins-bad gstreamer-plugins-bad-free-extras gstreamer-plugins-bad-nonfree gstreamer-plugins-ugly gstreamer-ffmpeg

Si quieren reproducir DVDs

sudo yum -y install libdvdread libdvdnav lsdvd libdvdcss

Si quieren soporte Flash usen el comando que les corresponde.

Para 32bit:

sudo yum -y localinstall http://linuxdownload.adobe.com/adobe-release/adobe-release-i386-1.0-1.noarch.rpm

Para 64bit

sudo yum -y localinstall http://linuxdownload.adobe.com/adobe-release/adobe-release-x86_64-1.0-1.noarch.rpm

Y luego instalen Flash:

sudo yum -y install flash-plugin

No me gusta Gnome, quiero otra cosa

Si Gnome no los convence pueden intentar diferentes escritorios.
En Fedora pueden instalar KDE, Cinnamon, LXDE, XFCE, entre otros...

KDE: si quieren instalar KDE 4.10 solo usen el comando siguiente:

sudo yum groupinstall @kde-desktop

Cierren su sesión y vuelvan a iniciarla escogiendo KDE como escritorio.

Si quieren instalar Gnome Classic Mode:

sudo yum -y install gnome-classic-session

Cinnamon

Una gran alternative de Gnome y Gnome Classic es Cinnamon.

sudo yum groupinstall "Cinnamon Desktop"

Hay otros escritorios que pueden intentar pero personalmente nunca lo he hecho. Esta es una lista breve de lo que puede interesarles: XFCE, LXDE, Awesome, Xmonad, MATE... entre otros.

Me gusta Gnome pero me gustaría modificarlo un poco

Si les gusta Gnome, lo pueden modificar dependiendo de sus necesidades.

Pueden instalar extensiones yendo a esta página: https://extensions.gnome.org/

Pueden agregar widgets, espacios de trabajo y nuevas tareas.

A lo mejor les interese Gnome Tweak Tools también.
 
sudo yum -y install gnome-tweak-tool

Internet

Google Chrome or Chromium: si no les gusta Firefox pueden instalar Google Chrome.
Para hacerlo deberán usar yum y localinstall con el comando que corresponda a su sistema:

Para 32Bit:

sudo yum -y localinstall https://dl.google.com/linux/direct/google-chrome-stable_current_i386.rpm

Para 64Bit:

sudo yum -y localinstall https://dl.google.com/linux/direct/google-chrome-stable_current_x86_64.rpm

Si quieren instalar Chromium añadan el archivo siguiente en la carpeta /etc/yum.repos.d

http://repos.fedorapeople.org/repos/spot/chromium-stable/fedora-chromium-stable.repo

Actualicen los paquetes

sudo yum update

E instalen Chromium

sudo yum install chromium

Transmission

Si quieren descargar archivos usando Torrents, hay un cliente que está incluido en Fedora. Transmission es ligero y hará lo necesario: descargar torrents. Pueden modificar un poco su configuración también.

Hay otras opciones en Linux como KTorrent, Deluge...

Thunderbird

Si quieren instalar Thunderbird lo único que tienen que hacer es:

sudo yum -y install thunderbird

Multimedia

Un problema muy frecuente que se lee en los foros, es la reproducción de DVDs. Como los DVDs utilizan un sistema de seguridad, hay que instalar una biblioteca especial y ejecutar un archivo de configuración.

Pueden ver como hacerlo en la sección Codec de este post.

VLC

Un gran reproductor multimedia es VLC, básicamente lee TODO y cuando digo TODO es en serio.

sudo yum -y install vlc

Clementine


Si no son muy fans de Rhythmbox como yo o les hacen faltas algunas funcionalidades como un ecualizador o un poco más de personalización, Clementine es una gran opción.

sudo yum -y install qtwebkit clementine

GIMP
Si les gusta la fotografía y no quieren invertir un montón de dinero en Photoshop, pueden intentar GIMP. Yo lo uso todos los días y tienen un montón de funcionalidades.

Solo usen el comando siguiente:

sudo yum -y install gimp

Si quieren editar archivos RAW necesitarán este paquete extra:

sudo yum -y install gimp-ufraw

Esto permetirá a GIMP editar el archivo RAW una vez que lo ha importado.


Inkscape

Si uds. hacen un poco de diseño un gran programa muy fácil de usar es Inkscape. He aquí un ejemplo de lo que hice un domingo sin deberes.

sudo yum install inkscape

OpenShot

Si quieren hacer un poco de edición vídeo en Linux, creo que la mejor opción por ahora es OpenShot. Después de añadir los repositorios RPMFusion usen

sudo yum -y install openshot

Se acaban de enterar que Steam ahora también está en Linux?

Así Steam lanzó su cliente para Linux hace algunos meses ya y está bastante interesante.

Si quieren instalarlo sigan estas instrucciones:

cd /etc/yum.repos.d/

sudo wget http://spot.fedorapeople.org/steam/steam.repo

sudo yum install steam

Así es como se ve en Fedora:

Messenger

Pidgin

Si como yo han tenido algunos problemas con Empathy otra alternativa es Pidgin, igual soporta muchos protocolos como MSN, Facebook, Google Talk...

sudo yum -y install pidgin

Skype

Para instalar Skype sigan este gran tutorial.

Cloud y backup

Dropbox

La mayoría de gente utiliza cuentas en el cloud para sus archivos y poder tenerlos disponibles cuando sea. Hay que ir a la página de descargas de Dropbox y seleccionar el paquete RPM.

Pueden usar el Terminal también:

32-bit:

cd ~ && wget -O - "https://www.dropbox.com/download?plat=lnx.x86" | tar xzf -

64-bit:

cd ~ && wget -O - "https://www.dropbox.com/download?plat=lnx.x86_64" | tar xzf -

Luego ejecuten Dropbox que está instalado en la carpeta .dropbox-dis .

~/.dropbox-dist/dropboxd

Deja-Dup

Algo que me encanta de Linux es que tiene su propio programa para poder respaldar todos los datos importantes que queremos, ya sea en una cuenta de Ubuntu One, en un servidor FTP o en un disco duro externo.

Algunas herramientas para su sistema

LibreOffice

En Fedora necesitan instalar LibreOffice manualmente:

sudo yum -y install libreoffice-writer libreoffice-calc libreoffice-impress libreoffice-draw

Gestion de archivos

Si quieren leer PDFs necesitan algo como Evince:

sudo yum -y install evince

Si bajan muchos datos de Internet y deben descomprimirlos o comprimirlos con mucha frecuencia, he aquí una lista de paquetes que les van a ser muy útiles.

sudo yum -y install unace unrar zip unzip p7zip-full p7zip-rar sharutils rar
 

Nota: Si instalan los paquetes rar, unrar van a poder leer comics en formato .cbr directamente con Evince.

Necesito algunos programas de Windows

Wine

Si necesitan instalar algunos programas de Windows porque simplemente no hay alguna alternativa en el mundo libre pueden usar el emulador Wine. No todo va a servir y yo no he intentado mucho con este emulador pero sé que se pueden hacer muchas cosas como instalar Microsoft Office.

sudo yum install wine



Virtual Box

Si Wine no funciona pueden optar por crear una máquina virtual e instalar el programa en ella. El problema es que hay que tener un ISO de Windows.

Sigan los siguientes pasos para instalar VirtualBox:

su

yum -y install kernel-headers dkms gcc

wget -c -P/etc/yum.repos.d/ http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/rpm/fedora/virtualbox.repo

echo 'skip_if_unavailable=1' >> /etc/yum.repos.d/virtualbox.repo
 
yum -y install --enablerepo=virtualbox VirtualBox-4.2-?.?.*

/etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup

Programación (o "maldición porqué no compila")

Para la gente que usa su máquina para programar he aquí una lista de lo que pueden querer instalar para programar tranquilamente:

Essentials

Primero hay que instalar los paquetes neceserios para poder compilar, entre esos hay gcc

sudo yum install gcc make bison

¿gcc está muy viejo?

Clang es un compilador muy interesante para programas en C y en C++, tiene la misma sintaxis que gcc. Muestra los errores que cometimos donde están exactamente.

sudo yum install clang

Geany

Un editor simpático que reconoce algunos lenguajes de programación.

sudo yum install geany

Eclipse

Para programar en Java lo único que hay que hacer es instalar Eclipse.

sudo yum -y install eclipse


Ahora sí todo debería estar a su gusto. ¡Disfruten su nueva instalación!


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[To do] Top thing to do after installing Fedora 19

Top things to do after installing Fedora 19

¿De qué está hablando? Versión en español

Ok, I installed Fedora. What do I do now?

In this post I will show what I recommend you to do/install to make your computer run smoothly with Fedora.

I strongly recommend the use of a Terminal, except when I tell you to open "Software Update"  for example.

Updating and installing the packages

Definitely the first thing you need to do after installing Fedora is updating your packages and upgrading your software. Open "Software Software" and introduce your password.

The updates will load and you will be able to install them afterwards.

Or you could launch a Terminal and run the following command (as root):

sudo yum -y update

The first time you do this could take some time.

Usefull tools for this tutorial

You will need some tools for this tutorial and they will be very usefull afterwards.

Install wget and curl:

sudo yum install wget curl

Installing proprietary drivers

Graphic drivers : If your computer has a nVidia chipset you will need the proprietary drivers that correspond to your case. First check your hardware:

lspci | grep -i VGA

Or if you have a chipset with Optimus Technology use:

lspci | grep -i 3D

If you have that kind of chipset you must install Bumblee, please check this page.

Add the RPMFusion repositories. Install the free and non-free packages:

sudo yum localinstall --nogpgcheck http://download1.rpmfusion.org/free/fedora/rpmfusion-free-release-19.noarch.rpm

sudo yum localinstall --nogpgcheck http://download1.rpmfusion.org/nonfree/fedora/rpmfusion-nonfree-release-19.noarch.rpm

Then install the drivers:

sudo yum install akmod-nvidia xorg-x11-drv-nvidia-libs

Multimedia Codecs

You need to add the RPMFusion repositories to do this.

Install the codecs that you need. Go to a Terminal and use the following command (adapt it to your needs):

sudo yum -y install gstreamer-plugins-bad gstreamer-plugins-bad-free-extras gstreamer-plugins-bad-nonfree gstreamer-plugins-ugly gstreamer-ffmpeg

If you want to play DVDs

sudo yum -y install libdvdread libdvdnav lsdvd libdvdcss

If you want Flash support add the repositories that concern you.

For 32bit:

sudo yum -y localinstall http://linuxdownload.adobe.com/adobe-release/adobe-release-i386-1.0-1.noarch.rpm

For 64bit

sudo yum -y localinstall http://linuxdownload.adobe.com/adobe-release/adobe-release-x86_64-1.0-1.noarch.rpm

And then install Flash:

sudo yum -y install flash-plugin

I don't like Gnome, I want something else

If you don't like Gnome you can try different desktops. Fedora has support for Gnome, XMonad, Enlightenment, among others..

KDE: if you want to install KDE 4.10 just follow these steps:

sudo yum groupinstall @kde-desktop

Log out and then you will be able to use KDE.

If you want to install Gnome Classic Mode:

sudo yum -y install gnome-classic-session

Cinnamon

A great alternative for Gnome and Gnome Classic is Cinnamon.

sudo yum groupinstall "Cinnamon Desktop"

There are some others desktops that you may want to try, but I haven't. Here is a quick list of what you may want to install: XFCE, LXDE, Awesome, Xmonad, MATE... among others.

I like Gnome but I will like to tweak it

If you like Gnome, you can modify it so it will adjust to your needs.

You can install extensions by going to this site: https://extensions.gnome.org/

You can add widgets, workspaces and new tasks.

You may want to try Gnome Tweak Tools
 
sudo yum -y install gnome-tweak-tool

Internet

Google Chrome or Chromium: if you don't like Firefox you can install Google Chrome.
You can install Chrome using yum and localinstall with the following commands:

For 32Bit:

sudo yum -y localinstall https://dl.google.com/linux/direct/google-chrome-stable_current_i386.rpm

For 64Bit:

sudo yum -y localinstall https://dl.google.com/linux/direct/google-chrome-stable_current_x86_64.rpm

If you want to install Chromium. Add the following file in your /etc/yum.repos.d folder

http://repos.fedorapeople.org/repos/spot/chromium-stable/fedora-chromium-stable.repo

Update your packages

sudo yum update

And finally install Chromium

sudo yum install chromium

Transmission

If you want to download files using Bit Torrent, there is a client included with Fedora. Transmission is light and will do just enough: downloading torrents. You can change some of its configuration.

There are other options in Linux, like KTorrent, Deluge...

Thunderbird

If you want to install Thunderbird the only thing you need to do is:

sudo yum -y install thunderbird

Multimedia

A very frequent question that you find in some pages, is how to enable DVD playback. All DVDs uses an encryption algorithm, you will need to install a package that will decrypt the data.

You can find how to do that in the "Codec" section of this post.

VLC

A really great media player is VLC, basically it plays everything that you may want.

sudo yum -y install vlc

Clementine

Install Clementine a great media player, if you don't like Rythmbox

sudo yum -y install qtwebkit clementine

GIMP

If you do some photography and you don't want to invest a lot of money in Photoshop, you can try installing GIMP. I use it everyday and it has a lot of functionalities.

Just use the following command:

sudo yum -y install gimp

You will need this extra package to edit RAW files:

sudo yum -y install gimp-ufraw

This will allow GIMP to edit the imported file.


Inkscape

If you like to design sometimes a really great program to use is Inkscape. Here is an example I made on a rainy sunday.

sudo yum install inkscape

OpenShot

If you want to do some video editing in Linux, I think the best option is OpenShot. After adding the RPMFusion repositories use 

sudo yum -y install openshot

Did you just find out that Steam is on Linux?

That's right, Steam released its client for Linux a few months ago and it looks very good.

If you want to test it follow this intructions:

cd /etc/yum.repos.d/

sudo wget http://spot.fedorapeople.org/steam/steam.repo

sudo yum install steam

Here is how it looks in Fedora:

Messenger

Pidgin

If you have had some problems with Empathy another alternative is Pidgin, it supports many protocols like MSN, Facebook, IRC, Google Talk...

sudo yum -y install pidgin

Skype

If you want to install Skype in Fedora install by following this great tutorial.

Cloud y backup

Dropbox

A lot of people uses the cloud to make backups or to have many files accessibles from any computer. Go to the download page of Dropbox and use the RPM package.

You can do it with the command line too:

32-bit:

cd ~ && wget -O - "https://www.dropbox.com/download?plat=lnx.x86" | tar xzf -

64-bit:

cd ~ && wget -O - "https://www.dropbox.com/download?plat=lnx.x86_64" | tar xzf -

Next, run the Dropbox daemon from the newly created .dropbox-dist folder.

~/.dropbox-dist/dropboxd

Deja-Dup

Something that I love about Linux is that there are many good programs to do backups. You can sync your files with a FTP, with Ubuntu One or with a hard drive.

Some tools for your system

LibreOffice

In Fedora you will need to install the LibreOffice suite.
Use this command:

sudo yum -y install libreoffice-writer libreoffice-calc libreoffice-impress libreoffice-draw

File managing

If you want to read PDF files you need something like Evince:

sudo yum -y install evince

If you download or share many files in the Internet maybe you need some tools for compressing. Here is a list of packages that you may need.

sudo yum -y install unace unrar zip unzip p7zip-full p7zip-rar sharutils rar
 

Note: If you intall the rar, unrar packages you will be able to read comics in .cbr format with Evince or oKular.

I need some Windows programs

Wine

If you need to install some Windows programs because you can't find a solution in the opensource world you can install the Wine emulator. You won't be able to run everything but I know that you can install a lot of useful things like Microsoft Office.

sudo yum install wine



Virtual Box

If Wine doesn't do the trick you can create a virtual machine and install the program that you want in it. The problem es that you need an ISO image of Windows. You will need to prepare the packages to install VirtualBox:

su

yum -y install kernel-headers dkms gcc

wget -c -P/etc/yum.repos.d/ http://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/rpm/fedora/virtualbox.repo

echo 'skip_if_unavailable=1' >> /etc/yum.repos.d/virtualbox.repo
 
yum -y install --enablerepo=virtualbox VirtualBox-4.2-?.?.*

/etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup

Programming (a.k.a "Why don't you compile?")

For people who use their machine for writing code, here is a list that you use for installing some basic packages for programming:

Essentials

First of all you want to install some basic packages that allows you to compile, this packages include gcc for example

sudo yum install gcc make bison

¿gcc is too old school?

Clang is a great compiler for C and C++, it has the same syntax that gcc but it has a nice output:

sudo yum install clang

Geany

A great text editor that can recognize various languages.

sudo yum install geany

Eclipse

If you want to do some programming in Java use the command:

sudo yum -y install eclipse


And you're good to go. Enjoy your new install!


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