If you are using Kubuntu, there is a command called “kubuntu run” that can be used to start and stop the Kubuntu computer. This command can be found in the “Applications” folder. To use this command, you need to first open the “kubuntu run” command prompt by opening the “terminal” program and typing “kubuntu run”. After running the “kubuntu run” command, you will see a dialog box that looks like this: The first thing you need to do is enter the name of your Kubuntu computer. The second thing you need to do is select whether or not you want to start automatically when your computer starts up. If you choose to start automatically, then your computer will start up with Kubuntu installed and running. If you don’t want your computer to start up with Kubuntu installed and running, then you can click on the “No” button next to “Start automatically when my computer starts up?” in the dialog box below. The third thing that you need to do is select whether or not you want to enable password protection for your Kubuntu computer. If password protection is enabled, then your computer will not be able to be used without a valid password. The fourth thing that you need to do is select whether or not you want access control for your Kubuntu computer. If access control is enabled, then only people who have been authenticated by a moderator can access your Kubuntu computer. The fifth thing that you need to do is select whether or not you want updates available for your Kubuntu machine. If updates are available for your machine, then they will be downloaded and installed on your machine as soon as they are available. The sixth thing that you need to do is select whether or notyou want help from someone who has been working on Ubuntu for a while. If help from someone who has been working on Ubuntu is desired, then they will be listed in the “Help me
The quickest way to run a command on Ubuntu or Kubuntu is to use the Alt+F2 shortcut key. This pops up a dialog that looks like this:
You can type any command that you would regularly use from a terminal window and it will run. Using the Options button gives you a number of other interesting options. Let’s try a simple ls -l command:
We’ve checked the “Run in terminal window” checkbox so that the output of the command will show up in a terminal window. On Ubuntu this doesn’t seem to work right, but in Kubuntu or KDE this is really useful. Either hit enter or click the Run button, and you’ll see something like this:
This is extremely useful for quickly getting the results of commands like ifconfig where you just need the output of the command.
Another neat feature is that the Run Command remembers the settings for each command. In the last command we typed ‘ls -l’ and checked the “run in terminal window” box. When we type in something else, the settings are defaulted:
But if we start typing ‘ls -l’ again, it automatically checks the checkbox that we set before:
The other options include running a command as a different user and setting the priority of the command. For the most part, you’ll just type sudo or gksu before the command if it needs to run as root, but if you were trying to run a command as a different user entirely, it would be useful.
