How to download, install, and configure the Plank Dock in Ubuntu

How to download, install, and configure the Plank Dock in Ubuntu

A well-known fact is that Linux is a user-defined system with many options available-as an operating system, there are various releases, for a single release, there are many desktop environments to choose from. Like other operating system users, Linux users have different tastes and preferences, especially for desktops.

Some users are not very concerned about their desktops, while others are very concerned. Make sure that their desktops look cool and attractive. In this case, there are a lot of good applications that can be used. There is an application that can bring vitality to your desktop-especially when you use a global menu-this is the dock. There are many dock applications available in Linux. If you want to be the most concise, choose Plank. The article will discuss this application later.

Note: The examples and commands mentioned above have passed the test on Ubuntu (version 14.10) and Plank (version 0.9.1.1383.

 

Plank

The official document describes Plank as the simplest dock on the planet ". The purpose of this project is to provide only one function required by the dock. Although this is a basic library, it can be expanded to create other dock programs with more advanced functions.

It is worth mentioning that in elementary OS, Plank is pre-installed. In addition, Plank is the basis of Docky, and Docky is also a very popular dock application, which is very similar in function to the Dock of Mac OS X.

 

Download and install

Run the following command on the terminal to download and install Plank:

1. sudo add-apt-repository ppa:docky-core/stable
2. sudoapt-get update
3. sudoapt-get install plank

After the installation is successful, you can open the application by entering Plank in the Unity Dash (see the image below) or from the application menu, if you do not use the Unity environment.

 

Features

When the Plank is enabled, you will see it docked in the middle of the bottom of your desktop.

As shown in the preceding figure, the dock contains many orange-labeled application icons, indicating that these applications are running. You can click an icon to open the application. At the same time, right-clicking an application icon will give more options that you may be interested in. For example, see the following screen snapshot:

To obtain the configuration options, you need to right-click the Plank icon (first on the left) and then click the Preferences option. The following window appears.

As you can see, the Preferences window contains two tags: Apperance and Behavior, which are selected by default. The Appearance tab Bar contains settings related to the Plank topic, the dock position, alignment, and icon. The Behavior tab Bar contains settings related to the dock.

For example, in Appearance, I changed the dock position to the right and locked the icon in Behavior (this indicates that the "Keep in Dock" option is no longer available in the right-click option ").

As you can see, the changes take effect. Similarly, you can change any available settings based on your individual needs.

 

Conclusion

As I said at the beginning, using the dock is not mandatory. Even so, using it will make things easier, especially when you get used to Mac, and recently switched to Linux for some reasons. In itself, Plank not only provides simplicity, but also credibility and stability-this project has been well maintained.