So I recently made the switch from Winows to Ubuntu…
Does anyone have any recommendations on where to even start? Like essential things to download from the start? Customization options? App stores? Apps/software?
Any guides or personal insight would be appreciated! Seems there’s alot more to learn compared to Windows, it’s a but overwhelming to be honest.
Thanks in advance!
It would mostly depend on what do you use your computer for.
I suggest using it and taking it from there. Certain needs will arise as you go on, and there’s plenty of documentation available online. Don’t try to fly when you can’t walk yet.
Any guides or personal insight would be appreciated! Seems there’s alot more to learn compared to Windows, it’s a but overwhelming to be honest.
So, why customize and install something you don’t even know if you need or not? You’ll just get more overwhelmed. Ubuntu is good out of the box.
Just learn to use what you have already. If you need something specific and you don’t know how to get, then you should ask for advice.
Just to explore some software you can use “App Center” if you’re on Ubuntu 23.10, or “Ubuntu Software” on earlier versions. But generally you should decide what to do first, and then search for the tools, not install multiple tools first and then think what to do with all of that mess.
Look at this - you don’t have to do everything, but this is a good start.
Snaps are great, they’re safe and supported by the Distro. Best place to start is updating your system then doing a backup. Create a backup of your data is the most important thing you could ever do.
Next, firewall setup. You want to enable your system firewall. This is great if you’re on a laptop and you use public networks (or just good in general).
Last, join the community. Ubuntu has a great community that can help you with common new user questions. Reddit is nice, but it can also lead to some very toxic behavior.
Welcome to the GNU/Linux Community.
One suggestion I haven’t seen yet: look at the lower left corner of your screen for the 9 dots. Click that, then click Software. Search for stuff you want there. It will take random queries like “VPN” and return all the VPNs in the repository.
I’m a big fan of Kubuntu. Worth the switch imo.
Dont give up it’ll get better. Frequent backups in case you have to reinstall. Don’t do anything too risky until you get used to it more.
tailscale, kdeconnect, scrcpy, nomachine, guake, vsftpd or jellyfin, gmenu-simple-editor, gnome tweaks and some other gnome plugins, maybe some gtk themes
Gnome extensions are something you might want to look into for fun tools and Gnome Tweak Tool for customizing the look of your desktop environment. After my switch the first thing I’ve spent hours with was fiddling around with the ability to make it look whatever I want it to which gives a great freedom I never experienced before.I’m an avid Total Commander enjoyer on Windows and I’ve spent countless hours of looking for and trying linux alternatives. I found Double Commander to be the closest to it for desktop and mc for the terminal.My terminal based text editor of choice is micro because the highlighting is great in it and the shortcuts are the standard ones not completely different as many of the cli based editors tend to be.My favorite media player for music is Audacious. You can import Winamp skins for it which I found mindblowing.You mentioned that you want it to interact with Android devices. Check out GSConnect extension for some fun ways to interact with your phone. For example I added a script that I can run from my phone and it locks the computer’s screen.
There’s really a lot of new experiences ahead of you, some good - some bad, but overall I hope you’ll enjoy your new environment 
I would say look at what you use your pc for and then see what software you need, you many different answers it all depends on what you actually be doing
Default start: Think Chromebook: Try to run everything you can from within Firefox which is your default browser. Expand from there.
Ubuntu has a build in App store.
It is named “Software” I think.
There you find Spotifiy, Steam etc.
You can also find apps in https://flathub.org/
Just use flathub for installing commands . It will be a better library for begginers
so you’ve just entered into unknown dungeon on your own peril?
I highly recommend reading ubuntu server guide for general overview of how to do things.
For enhancing user experience I would offer a small adventure like removing Libreoffice default install from ubuntu’s *deb repository and then installing it as a snap package. So you’ll get some use cases for apt and snap commands. As well as switching the Thundebird from the deb repo to Snapcraft’s one.
Install Opera browser snap from Ubuntu Software. Download Chrome and Edge from their sites respectively, try to install them.
Then try to setup your home network with netplan command and its horrible YAML config file.
And finally discover how to setup qemu/kvm and cockpit :-)) Read how to use virt-manager, how to setup a bridge for networking with your virtual machines. See what cockpit-machines can do.
I made the switch like you a few months back. Now I do everything in vi! :WQ:Q:q!::wQ:x:quit:esc
When you say music, you mean Spotify/Tidal? Or like a DAW?
A smallish thing, but if you’re used to the free Windows Adobe Reader for PDFs then the Ubuntu default reader you get will be sorely dissapointing.
Don’t try to install the wine-enabled acrobat reader that the Ubuntu store has. Junk.
I just finally told my Ubuntu desktop to use Libreoffice Writer to open PDFs, and it’s the best one yet, great stuff actually.
So install Libreoffice Suite for sure then right a pdf file in Files app > Open With… > Other Apps > Libreoffice Writer, and turn on the Always Use for This File Type button.
It’s a great pdf reader/writer.
Changing your desktop environment to something you like more would be a good starter. I love KDE Plasma bc it’s pretty to the eyes and featured. Some would call it bloated but I use almost everything that came prepacked into KDE like KTorrent for instance gets used a lot. Use your computer for a minute with Ubuntu, make a list of things you don’t like, and use that list. You can change so much about the system. Gotta love GNU/Linux