This file is meant to summarize a few configs / setups / things to install on my linux environment to be able to work confortably.

Remap keyboard to exchange 5 -> T, F4 -> 5, T -> F4 to work around my broken keyboard.

I edited (after backup) the /usr/share/X11/xkb/symbols/fr file, to add at the end a "French Custom" layout.
I then added an entry in /usr/share/X11/xkb/rules/evdev.lst and evdev.xml in the variant section, to point to this layout. This is necessary to be able to change the keyboard layout from gnome settings : Settings > Region & Language > + > French > Custom.

A probably better solution would have been to create a new file, but I couldn't make that work.

I also tried xmodmap, but it seems to be deprecated, but it had a nice UI to edit the layout.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Custom%20keyboard%20layout%20definitions
https://askubuntu.com/questions/482678/how-to-add-a-new-keyboard-layout-custom-keyboard-layout-definition < this one is nice.

libinput-gestures lets you define any custom command on 3 or 4 fingers swipes.

Works well but for switching workspaces, it feels laggy because it doesn't stick to fingers. Gnome should however support that by I never managed to make it work so far.

https://github.com/bulletmark/libinput-gestures
https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gnome-shell/-/issues/516

Goal: have an equivalent of AirDrop, to send / receive files, share browser tabs and clipboard.

Installing firefox on both devices, logged in with the same account, lets you share tabs easily.

For the rest, KDE developped KDE Connect which does exactly that. It was ported to Gnome with Gnome Connect.

The clipboard sync doesn't seem to work very reliably, and sometimes the connection is lost for some reason, but overall it's really cool.

I use gphotos-sync to backup my photos directly to my external hard drive. It's nice because it also backs up album as folders of symlinks, which can be pretty convenient.

The only annoying bit is that it didn't find exactly how I could install it properly, so currently I made a gphotos-sync folder under ~/.local/bin, and a Pipenv environment in it with gphotos-sync installed.

So to backup run

cd ~/.local/bin/gphotos-sync
pipenv run gphotos-sync /media/gregnix/GregWD/Google\ Photo/

When booting, linux calls a special program called Plymouth which display text or an animation while the kernel is loaded and other stuff happen. This animation (the default Ubuntu loading) can be changed by using a different theme.

This amazing repo contains 80+ themes that can be used.

To change theme:

# Copy theme to plymouth folder
sudo cp -r mytheme /usr/share/plymouth/themes

# Install theme (change <path_to_mytheme.plymouth>)
sudo update-alternatives --install /usr/share/plymouth/themes/default.plymouth default.plymouth /usr/share/plymouth/themes/<path_to_mytheme.plymouth> 100

# Select theme - this displays a list of installed themes, select yours
sudo update-alternatives --config default.plymouth

# Update initramfs
sudo update-initramfs -u

⚠️ Careful, if something isn't done properly (like setting the wrong path in update-alternatives as happened to me), you might break the startup. In that case, you can bypass Plymouth (called the splash screen):

In GRUB, move to Ubuntu, then press e. This should let you edit the command. Go down to the line starting with linux, and remove the arguments splash and quiet (verbose mode for good measure). The Ctrl+e to start. Once successfully started, try to fix things, for example selecting a theme you know works from sudo update-alternatives --config default.plymouth output.