1. Close all open applications, you can keep this browser window open
2. Open a terminal session (Applications -  Accessories – Terminal)
3. In the terminal type:

   sudo apt-get install gnome-app-install --reinstall

4. Hit enter and watch the gnome-app-install reinstall
5. All done, your Add/Remove Applications list should be working like new!

Let us know in the comments if this worked for you or if you had any issues.

Most Linux articles I have read and many Linux users that I have talked to seem to think that with Linux you will never need an Anti-virus.  At this time in history that my be true but its only a matter of time, right?.  With most any OS we can look back before it had a large market share and see that it did not seem to have to worry about viruses (Perhaps with the exception of windows :<)

Once Linux gets enough market share for it to make sense for hackers to start hitting Linux hard, then viruses attempts will start coming.  We must remember that where there’s a will there’s a way and that way will probably be found.  Viruses, spy-ware, rootkits, etc are big money and people will do anything for that money.

Personally on my Ubuntu Linux installation I use ClamAV for my Anti-Virus which seems to work great, although it is hard to find what a good Anti-Virus is for Linux.  Having ClamAV installed just gives me another reason to feel great about the security of Linux.   Now don’t get me wrong and think that I am saying that Linux is not secure because I am not, compared to Windows, Linux is Fort Knox.  What I am saying is that eventually perhaps Linux’s time will come to feel the heat just Like Mac OS X‘s time has come as of late.

As Linux users do we need to start taking the threat of an eventual virus more seriously before its to late and we start getting infected?  Let me know if you think I’m right for being worried or you think I’m just paranoid.

The meeting started off with two minute introductions where you got to introduce yourself and tell a little bit about your past week or so. I stated my name and that I was the owner of TCTEKS as well as that my week mostly consists of fixing hundreds of other peoples computers (I love my job). This is a very good way to start off the meeting as in addition to me there was a few other new people attending.

After the introductions it broke down into random chatting about different subject that people brought up such as podcasts, network, and Linux of course. This lasted for a good 10 – 20 minutes and was very interesting as everyone is very into technology and Linux.

Once the chatting slowed down then we got into the meat of the meeting (60 minutes+) which is going over the weekly newsletter which can be found on the website. This was very interesting and had a wide range of targeted topics such as Gnome 2.2 now available, Don’t trust Microsoft, Netbeans, Hulu.com, etc… The discussion was very lively, spirited, and involved everyone.

After the newsletter discussion is over the meeting once again broke down into random chatting about technology subjects, Many based on what we just talked about in the newsletter as well as many others such as Cantenas, dd-wrt, etc… This goes on until one at a time people started leaving with the meeting coming to a close around 9:15pm.

Overall this was a very positive meeting and I will definitely be making this a weekly event on my calendar. Feel free to drop me a line if you have any questions as well as feel free to join the meeting next week as its a very welcoming atmosphere.

What I do not like about the interface is that if you leave it at its automagically configured settings then it is painfully slow. Unless your computer is running 2GB’s of RAM (ours is running 1GB) then it just seems to slow to a crawl and lets not forget the random lockups. If you turn off all the graphical enhancements then it really speeds up and is mostly usable.

Some other issues are the constant barrage of pop-ups asking are you sure you want to do this? and then after say ok it asks again are you really sure? Just to delete an icon it takes three clicks and two pop-ups which is just crazy. I know this is in the name of security but take a look at Ubuntu Linux and Mac OS X if you want to see a good handle on security. Security can be attained while not being completely annoying.

So all that talk brings me to the point of trying to stay away from Vista if at all possible. I know Microsoft is going to be and currently is pushing Vista on people and XP machines are becoming hard to find but I would search high and low for them if you have the time. Currently we have all XP machines (new and used) and are staying away from Vista as long as possible. This is also a good time to try out Ubuntu Linux (which has come a long way and is a very viable option) or give Mac OS X a shot which is a proven alternative to windows.

Let us know what you think in the comments below.