I want to list out all of the things I am doing on my computer to get it up and running.

Updates

First, after install I ran a system update:

sudo apt-get update

then:

sudo apt-get upgrade

This brought the system mostly up to date.  I tend to default to the explicit command line update for Ubuntu due to habit, but I imagine the update application is just fine as well.  I tend to run these two commands before starting for the day on any Ubuntu box of my own that I use in order to keep the system up to date.

Synergy

I have this computer setup next to my main desktop and I don’t want to have 2 sets of keyboards/mice.  Back in college I used an application called Synergy to connect between my desktop and laptop but haven’t used it in a while.  I downloaded the Windows 64 bit version (Since I am running Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit) and installed it.  I ran it, went into the Server Configuration utility (The Configure Server… button), dragged a screen into the box to the left of my main computer (Starbuck), double clicked it, and named it EmbedDev(since that is the name of the computer).  I hit Ok twice to get back to the main screen, then opened Settings under the Edit menu.  I checked ‘Start Synergy after logging in’ and ‘Automatically start server/client’ so it would automatically start when I turn on the computer since I’m lazy and like things to be automatic.

Next I downloaded the 32 bit Ubuntu/Debian version from the site and installed it using the package manager.  It threw some warnings about not trusting it since it didn’t give a final install size, but I went on and installed it anyways.  I opened it for the first time, clicked Client, and put in the Windows computer’s IP address (It shows the current computer’s IP address, so I just entered what was showing on my Windows desktop(192.168.1.106 in this case)), and clicked start. It ended up working pretty easily like I remember.  The next step was to set it to automatically start on that computer too.  I went to the Dash Home and opened ‘Startup Applications’.  I hit Add, filled in ‘Synergy’ for Name, ‘synergyc 192.168.1.106’ for Command, hit Save, then Close.  I restarted since I had to for updates anyways, and sure enough I could pop my mouse over to it after it finished booting (It automatically logs me in since it’s just a desktop in my room.).  One keyboard/mouse(Logitech’s mk710) for two computers, win.