as the only techie around here il me faut installer ubuntu on multiple machines. some quirks until now, as i don’t find the standard installation too useful as it lacks some programs. this is for ubuntu jaunty amd64. do not apply if you don’t know what you are doing.

non-free packages
some additional non-free packages can be found on medibuntu

get mp3 working in sound-juicer

sudo apt-get install lame gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly gstreamer0.10-plugins-ugly-multiverse


sun java; flash player, mp3, some other things

sudo apt-get install ubuntu-restricted-extras


dvd css support

sudo /usr/share/doc/libdvdread3/install-css.sh


media players (xine & vlc)

sudo apt-get install xine-ui vlc

k3b with mp3 burning support

sudo apt-get install k3b libk3b3-extracodecs

additional sources i’m using:

# old amarok 1.4
deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/bogdanb/ppa/ubuntu jaunty main


encryption
Note: Ubuntu 9.10 and above has encryption built in support which is incompatible to this description. It uses a kernel module instead of a user mode filesystem. I do not recommend the method described here anymore!
http://www.gatorlug.org/node/123 gives some info about on the fly encryption of your home folder without having it as it’s own partition. but the pam.d configuration stuff is somewhat unclear, in the end its full ok to just add the following lines to end of the files:

# to /etc/pam.d/common-auth
auth sufficient pam_encfs.so


# to /etc/pam.d/common-session
session required pam_encfs.so


if you mess something up, pam will lock you out, so keep a root terminal open. if you locked yourself out (i did!) boot from a installation cd, mount your root folder and revert the changes.