Apt Installs Recommended Packages by Default

I only recently noticed that when I use apt-get install, it not only installs my desired package, but also every package that the package recommends. To halt this behaviour I had to add these lines to the /etc/apt/apt.conf file:

APT
{
Install-Recommends "false";
Install-Suggests "false";
};

Gnome Tweaks

Some of these could already be in effect depending on your distribution. Launch the configuration editor from Applications->System Tools->Configuration Editor or by typing gconf-editor in a terminal. Go down the tree to the following:

/apps/gnome-session/options

Here you can disable the show_splash_screen option for a login boost. Now go to:

/apps/metacity/general

Enable the reduced_resources option for a significant speed increase. A little further down the tree at:

/apps/nautilus/preferences

You can disable show_desktop to stop Nautilus from controlling the desktop. Of course this means that you won't get icons or a right-click menu on the desktop. Then, travel down to:

/apps/panel/global

Disable enable_animations and highlight_launchers_on_mouseover. Finally, if you append the following line to your ~/.gtkrc-2.0 file (create it if it doesn't exist) you remove GTK menu delays.

gtk-menu-popup-delay = 0

Parcellite v0.5

Last night I commited v0.5 of Parcellite. Though I'm not releasing it yet, it is fully functional. Aside from being translated from python to C, this version includes a simple CLI interface for command line access to the clipboard. I will make an official release soon after I browse through all the code cleaning up and fixing minor issues along the way. Get it from the subversion repository:

svn co http://xyhthyx.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/parcellite parcellite

To compile and install:

./autogen.sh
./configure
make
sudo make install

White Panel Text

Alot of people don't know that you can overwrite your current theme with a certain file in your home folder. If you notice in the above screenshot, I have white text on the panel while everything else defaults to black. To achive this, simply create the file .gtkrc-2.0 and place it in your home folder. In it, place the following code:

style "panel"
{
fg[NORMAL] = "#ffffff"
}
widget "*PanelWidget*" style "panel"
widget "*PanelApplet*" style "panel"
class "*Panel*" style "panel"
widget_class "*Mail*" style "panel"
class "*notif*" style "panel"
class "*Notif*" style "panel"
class "*Tray*" style "panel"

Now you can use dark panel backgrounds with light colored themes. To refresh the panel type killall gnome-panel or just exit to GDM and login again.