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Things to do after installing Lubuntu 20.04

Long ago I used KDE which was a simple and efficient desktop much like Windows95 in appearance and mode of operation. Then it got more complicated with the introduction of Plasma, making the computer sluggish, and so I switched to Gnome. Then Lubuntu came out, using LXDE, but it had problems at first, including no way of configuring a mouse for left-handed use. Eventually the problems were ironed out and I have used it for about the past ten years. It is distributed as the lightweight version of Ubuntu. It does the job and does not overload the computer, which normally runs at around 37 degrees.

It used to be the case that as you went from one version of Linux to an newer, or even changed distributions, your desktop remained unaltered. Unfortunately the Lubuntu developers have made fundamental alterations which are not an improvement. Instead of using the LXDE desktop, they have now changed to LXQT. Unfortunately, it has some very ugly panel widgets, and the display manager, sddm, offers an ugly and clunky login screen, and no easy way to change the background image. Whether or not additional installed applications are added to the menu is hit and miss.

So having completed the initial installation, it seems a good idea to install LXDE, the menu editor Alacarte and the display manager gdm3, activate the latter and log in with LXDE. Then you will get our old desktop back and everything works much as it did before, perhaps a little more crisply. It is obviously not thrashing the processor.

Open source developers are falling into the same trap as proprietary software producers, of being unable to leave well alone. When the technology is mature, it does not need more than tweaks to improve the performance. However, there are some good new programs including the raw image processing software Raw Therapee, which replaces ufraw.

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