How To Enable 'Screen Keyboard' (Virtual Keyboard) Under Linux Mint 14 Nadia (Cinnamon)

New users of Linux Mint 14 (Nadia) with the Cinnamon desktop environment may find it difficult to enable the on-screen keyboard (virtual keyboard). In this tutorial, we will show you how to easily enable it using simple instructions supported by screenshots.

Getting Started

In the taskbar, click the caret icon and open Settings >> Applets:

Another window will appear, check on "Accessibility":

Close the Applets window. In the taskbar, you will notice that an icon for Accessibility is displayed, click it and enable "Screen Keyboard":

That's it!

How to Enable IP Forwarding Under Ubuntu/Linux Mint

In this tutorial, we will see how to enable IP Forwarding under Ubuntu/Linux Mint. IP Forwarding is required when users want to make their computers act as a router, gateway, DMZ, VPN server, and it is also used in internet connection sharing.

Getting Started

To check whether IP Forwarding is enabled or not, you can use this command:

sysctl net.ipv4.ip_forward

If it is disabled, you will get this output:

net.ipv4.ip_forward = 0

Enabling IP Forwarding Temporarily

To enable IP Forwarding temporarily, run these commands:

sudo su 

echo 1 > /proc/sys/net/ipv4/ip_forward

or

sudo su 

sudo sysctl -w net.ipv4.ip_forward=1

Re-check again the status of IP Forwarding with this command:

sysctl net.ipv4.ip_forward

If it is enabled, you will get this output:

net.ipv4.ip_forward = 1

However, IP Forwarding will be disabled once you reboot your system. For a permanent configuration, see below.

Enabling IP Forwarding Permanently

Open the terminal and edit the /etc/sysctl.conf file with this command:

sudo gedit /etc/sysctl.conf

Search and uncomment this line:

net.ipv4.ip_forward = 1

Save your file and exit, then run this command:

sudo sysctl -p /etc/sysctl.conf

NOTE: This tip is workable for Ubuntu 12.10/12.04/11.10 and Linux Mint 14/13 or older.

How To Install And Enable Ubuntu's Unity Desktop On Linux Mint 13

In this tutorial, we will see how to install and enable the Unity interface of Ubuntu under Linux Mint 13. As you know, the Linux Mint 13 distribution is based on Ubuntu 12.04 (Precise Pangolin), so all packages we are going to install will be from the Precise repository.

1. Unity Installation

Via the command line, run the following commands to install the Unity desktop:

sudo apt-get install unity gnome-session

sudo apt-get install unity-2d-panel unity-2d-launcher

You can also install Ubuntu Software Center with this command:

sudo apt-get install software-center

2. Enabling Unity

Log out the current session, click the session button, select "Ubuntu" and click "Change Session", then log back in:

Here are some screenshots of Linux Mint 13 with Unity enabled:

Enable ‘Notify OSD’ when Hovering Over ‘indicator-sound’ icon and Scrolling

True, I’ve had many issues with ‘PulseAudio’ with my previous, old, laptop. But it is working really well under the Vostro V131 notebook, and this time, I have no plans of getting rid of it .
Anyway, though ‘PulseAudio’ is a separate project, Ubuntu developers too have done a lot of work integrating ‘PulseAudio’ into the OS and making it user friendly.
Take ‘indicator-sound’ icon for example. It lets you access a lot of ‘PulseAudio’ sound server related options to easily getting access to some utilities that use it (such as ‘Rhythmbox’) etc. Plus, they have also integrated it with Ubuntu’s built-in notification message system (‘Notify OSD’), for indicating some of its events as well.
Speaking of its user-friendliness, though I discovered it quite recently, there is a simple ‘trick’ that you can use to easily up/down the volume in ‘PulseAudio’.

For example, let’s say that you had ‘Rhythmbox’ playing something from the background while browsing the web, and wanted to quickly lower the volume, without ever touching neither ‘Rhythmbox’ nor the ‘indicator-sound’ icon (clicking) that resides in the system tray area.
For those of you who have not heard, then all you have to do is, simply put your mouse pointer over the ‘indicator-sound’ icon, then use the scroll wheel, and the volume will go up or down.
Now, as the volumes changes, the ‘indicator-icon’ does display the levels using the built-in, ‘three, half-circular-lines’. Still, it does not indicate subtle or small changes.
Luckily though, we can use a small trick, that enables the default ‘Notify OSD’ volume level indicator (the one that shows up when you change the volume levels using your keyboard) for this ‘event’ too, as it includes these subtle changes.
If interested, you can use the below command in your Terminal for enabling it.

gsettings set com.canonical.indicator.sound show-notify-osd-on-scroll true

That’s it (no need to logout or restart the computer).
Note: This surely works in Ubuntu 12.10, might also work in 12.04 LTS too, not sure about other versions though.