Hello everyone, since i don't like gdesklets heavy requirements (because is too heavy for the hardware), i've decided to find a more lightweight alternative for gnome. So I present in this small guide how to install, and run adesklet on Gnome, KDE, and XFCE. This guide was tested in Dapper, Edgy and Feisty and Gutsy.
Requirements:
- Internet connection
- Universe repository enabled
First of all you will need to get the adesklets package by typing the folowing command in the console:
This will install the adesklet package and all related packages.sudo apt-get install adesklets
Important Note:
I advise the upgrade to 0.6.1 or upper, since some important,
bugs like memory leaks were adressed, for that see the folowing link:
After that, you need to download a valid desklet to use in adesklets
This can be done by two ways:
1 -
Go to http://adesklets.sourceforge.net/desklets.html, and download a valid desklet, if you want to see weather information try downloading the weatherforecast package
You will need to extract the package, and copy it to your home directory for instance:
2 -tar-xvf weatherforecast-0.2.0.tar.bz2
mv weatherforecast-0.2.0 /home/"you home name account"
run the folowing command and adesklets will automatically give you the option of downloading and installing the adesklets using an graphical user interface:
adesklets -i
Either way. assuming that you've chosen to go by the first step, go to your home directory and do:
that batch will ask you if you want to register this desklet, say 'r' (you want to register)cd weatherforecast-0.2.0
./weatherforecast.py
This will create the file .adesklets in your home directory and it will fill it with instructions, for running weatherforecast each time adesklets is executed
after that you need to know your city code, so go to weather.com and type your city name:
Click on your city in the search results, and he will display the weather information, copy the link and copy the reference between "/local/" and "?from=", see the following example:
http://www.weather.com/outlook/trave...om=search_city
for my city the weather.com code is POXX0035
after that do inside weatherforecast directory:
and replace the location default code with your code for instance i've did for my city:sudo nano config.txt
After that to run your adesklet do:'location': 'POXX0035'
for gnome:
for kde:adesklets --nautilus
for XFCE:adesklets --kde
for Enlightenment:adesklets --xfce4
If you want that adesklets load at boot time, in gnome you can go to System => Sessions, KDE and XFCE have equivalent ways of doing that, and add one of the previous lines to startup.adesklets --e16
If you want to download and install another desklet you can do something similar what i've did to install the weatherforecast desklet, all desklet include an config.txt, and an python batch file for registering the desklet.
The following scenarios were tested in a AMD k6-II 450 Mhz, with 256 MB RAM:
- Ubuntu (Gnome), and it worked fast.
- Kubuntu (KDE), and it worked fast.
- Xubuntu (XFCE), and it was even faster.
So you can take your own conclusions
Note for BERYL and Compiz users
Some users of beryl have been experiencing transparency problems with desklets. Since there isn't yet a solution, i found a workaround. This workaround was bnased on the feisty instructions available at the beryl project homepage. If u have any file already loading bery-manager please remove it, or don't load it.
Create the following file in your home directory
after that fill it with the following info:nano startcomposite.sh
and save the file.#!/bin/sh
adesklets --"your DE abbreviation"
sleep 4
beryl-manager
#if you have compiz to the following
#compiz --replace&
The trick here is to run adesklets before beryl / compiz, and make a sleep of 4, in order to adesklets to load before beryl-manager. Pay attention if you have more applications in the startup, you should include then in that file, for instance in my system, i also load amsn at startup so my startberyl.sh file is:
Finally i had this script in my autostarted applications (In my XFCE system, Applications > Settings > Autostarted Applications)#!/bin/sh
adesklets --xfce4
sleep 4
beryl-manager
amsn
This workaround worked on my Xubuntu Feisty system. In other systems the you may have to adjust the time of the sleep if it isn't enough to do the trick.
--
Adesklets its the only desklets program, prepared to be installed in either Gnome, KDE and XFCE, without installing "half system" (like it would be required if you wanted to install gdesklets in another DE than Gnome).
I've uploaded the following screenshot, taken from Xubuntu Feisty, for people who want to see adesklets in action, before installing it.
Hope this guide is useful to you!
--
UPDATE
A recent change on weather.com have broken weatherforecast desklet behaviour, if you were afected by this, please visit the following post, for the resolution.
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.p...94#post5152994
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