This is a collection of personal tweaks/rituals that make Ubuntu feel just right for me like how a ballerina customizes their pointe shoes to feel just right for them, as well as some other useful resources I keep going back to.
It would be cool if this was an Ansible playbook, but I haven't made it there yet. This also has some handy commands that I always look up and then forget.
The definitive NVIDIA Ubuntu Driver / CUDA Install Guide
Hermetic and Reproducible Python Package Template authored by yours truly.
I love to use Pixi, which can be installed with the following.
curl -fsSL https://pixi.sh/install.sh | sh
My Agentic Vibe Coding w/ Claude Code Tutorial
Claude code can be installed with the following.
curl -fsSL https://claude.ai/install.sh | bash
sudo apt-get install terminator # Make sure to turn on infinite scrollback: right click->preferences->profiles->scrolling
sudo apt-get install htop
sudo apt-get install nvtop
sudo apt-get install btop
sudo snap install code --classic
sudo apt-get install vim
sudo apt-get install openssh-client
sudo apt-get install openssh-server
The free plan from Tailscale works great (up to 100 personal devices!).
I tried to use WireGuard alone once and quickly retreated to the comfort of Tailscale.
I like to use NoMachine.
Importantly, for NoMachine to work, in the Settings, under System, "Desktop Sharing" and "Remote Control" need to be enabled.
I want to try Sunshine/Moonlight but I haven't gotten around to it yet.
I need to remember to always do the following. Settings -> Sharing -> Remote Desktop -> On.
Can be added to key agent here
Creating a private fork from a public repo - make sure to have public repo link ready
More information about private forks
Caffeine and Tactile are must have extensions IMO
sudo apt-get install gnome-shell-extension-manager
Obsidian Ubuntu 24.04 Permissions
Run Obsidian with the --disable-gpu flag to prevent any glitches with Wayland!
Sometimes libfuse2 is needed.
sudo apt update -y && sudo apt install -y libfuse2
Updating Watch Count Stack Overflow
Check disk usage with the following.
sudo apt-get install baobab
sudo baobab
If your overlay2 folder gets huge, see the following.
Get rid of old docker images with the following.
docker system df
# Clear builder cache with the following.
docker builder prune -a -f
K9s:
wget https://github.com/derailed/k9s/releases/download/v0.32.7/k9s_linux_amd64.deb && apt install ./k9s_linux_amd64.deb && rm k9s_linux_amd64.deb
Handy commands that I always forget:
kubectl config get-contexts # Get all contexts
kubectl get namespaces # Get all namespaces
kubectl config use-context <CONTEXT> # Set Contexts
kubectl config set-context --current --namespace=<NAMESPACE> # Set the namespace for the current context
I've used Keyd in the past but tbh I didn't love it and am considering switching to Hawck. I think binding the capslock key to something that isn't useless is great.
Keyd conf file:
[ids]
*
[main]
capslock = layer(capslock)
[capslock]
e = oneshot(control)
q = oneshot(alt)
o = oneshot(shift)
p = oneshot(tab)
g = b
h = left
j = down
k = up
l = right
u = S-'
i = S-5
For local agentic coding:
vim ~/.local/share/opencode/opencode.json
ollama run SimonPu/Qwen3-Coder:30B-Instruct_Q4_K_XL
Running Ollama:
docker rm ollama 2>/dev/null || true && docker run -d --gpus=all -v ollama:/root/.ollama -p 11434:11434 --name ollama ollama/ollama
docker exec -it ollama bash
# Some favorites of mine:
ollama run deepseek-r1:70b
ollama run qwen:110b
ollama run qwen2.5-coder:32b
# Example of increasing context size:
echo \
"FROM deepseek-r1:70b
PARAMETER num_ctx 60000
PARAMETER num_predict 30000" > Modelfile
ollama create deepseek-r1-60k-context-and-30k:70b -f Modelfile
ollama run deepseek-r1-60k-context-and-30k:70b --verbose
# Afterwards, make sure to clean up with CTRL + C, CTRL + D, and then docker stop ollama
Some VSCode Python extensions conflict with each other. I forgot how to resolve this. I think you may want just the Microsoft Python extension and as few others as possible. I also really like the rainbow indent extension it's great!
