Well, When I first switched to Linux, the worst part of it for me was to find applications that were similar to the windows applications I used daily, In this last 2 months I have found and decided on my suggested applications and I’m gonna list them out for you and how to get them as most of it was just a copy-paste terminal command line

Web Development

• Komodo Edit/IDE - This is the best Editor I’ve ever found, Plus its Multiplatform
• Drivel - This is a offline blogging tool, I use it to maintain this blog offline, then just post the articles all in one shot
• Konquer - This is my preferred FTP, File Manager, and General All Around Sliced Bread Application. I use it in both Gnome and KDE
• LAMP Server - By setting up a Apache, Mysql,PHP Server I can know test my web applications without FTP or anything really. I direct save the PHP files as I work and just open then directly in my Browser.

Multimedia

• Amarok - The best Music Player ever, What more can I say, Wikipieda Lyric and Band Information Automaticly Fetched, and Automatic Amazon Album Cover Finder and it uses MYSQL DB’s for your collection
• GIMP - Pretty much a Photo-shop Replacement, Its not quite as powerful/feature rich as photo-shop but it’s still useful
• VLC - My preferred movie player
• Photoshop 7.0 under Wine - I know its outdated but it works fine under fine and has support for the things GIMP doesnt have such as Layer Folders
• KFlickR - This is a Desktop Application for maintaining FlickR accounts, It makes bulk uploading files very easy and makes my life easy as can be.

Desktop Management - EyeCandy

• Beryl - Sorry I love Eye Candy
• Avant-Window-Navigator - A OS-X Style Docker Bar and Task Manager
• Conky - This is the best System Monitoring Software I’ve found yet and very Customizable too
• PhpSysInfo - This is a small PHP Application, that shows you System Information about your Computer. I find it useful to see what hardware has been found and is useful
• ZIM Desktop Wiki - This is a Wiki for your desktop, I use it for general note taking and in general I keep it open on 1 desktop at all times. Very useful for TO-DO Lists and whatever else you need

This page will be updated with instructions as to how to get-install all of these applications in the near future, Plus more applications I use everyday will also be added.

Ok now, that I have my Laptop running Ubuntu and Have been Using the Gnome Desktop for the last few months, I have been having problems with Beryl crashing alot atleast once a Day. So I decided to switch from GNOME to KDE window manager, The first thing I did was get all the KDE Packages installed which was a very easy apt-get deal. Open terminal and type the following….

Step 1 - Obtain Full KDE

Open Terminal, and copy/paste the following

    sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop

Now this is a large package, and will take afew minutes to get but it’s well worth it. After everything downloads, then reboot your Window Manager with CTRL-ALT-DEL, and select session KDE. This will open a KDE Splash screen and boot KDE in just afew mins. Now when mine first booted, my Beryl was already opened and setup Perfect. No changes were needed

Customize KDE

Well after browsing KDE it appeared everything was pretty much just like I wanted really lol. I did change my Taskbar Panel to Remove the Desktop Switched and Taskbar applets, as I use the Avant-Window-Navigator OS-X Style Docker bar for my Taskbar. From what I’ve seen so far I Havent had to make to many changes to KDE except edit my fonts to switch back to what I Liked in Gnome, you can Open the K Menu, Goto around the Bottom and click on System Settings thing change your Fonts to match up to your Gnome Fonts, I Personally use Lucida MAC Fonts to match my OS-X Style Desktop. I’m planning on using KDE for atleast a month before I decide to switch back to GNOME or what to do. Currently I just added 3 screenshots of my current KDE Desktop to my Flickr and afew more pictures of my 1 year old son also. You can view them at the bottom of the screen.. Which BTW I Found one execellent application that worked in both GNOME and KDE that I use to maintain my FlickR account which is called KFlickR you can get it with a simple

    sudo apt-get install kflickr

As the month goes on I will finish this page with the config modifications I had to do to make this work properly but it’s still to early to list to much.