Install and Use Nemo as default file manager in Ubuntu

After I upgraded to Mint 15 I had a bunch of issues on both my machines. Considering I had resorted to using Gnome fallback session instead of Mate or Cinnamon anyway I decided to reinstall Ubuntu which will hopefully be less buggy.

One of the things I like better about Mint is the Nemo file manager, which is streets ahead of the default Gnome file manager, the imaginatively named "Files".

Googling for "install nemo ubuntu" or similar returns a bunch of people suggesting you install the "noobslab" repository like this:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:noobslab/nemo

You can do that if you want to, but if you prefer to minimise the number of third party repositories on your system you can simply enable the ubuntu-backports  repo in your sources list instead.

Whichever way you choose, simply install Nemo like this:

sudo apt-get install nemo

Now that Nemo is intalled, we should make it the default file manager too. Enter this into the terminal console:

xdg-mime default nemo.desktop inode/directory application/x-gnome-saved-search

And that's all folks.

Adding a PPA

I'll use the Handbrake video encoder in this example but it will work for any PPA providing you have the correct id string. In this case that is "ppa:stebbins/handbrake-releases"

Add the PPA to your apt repository sources:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:stebbins/handbrake-releases

If you do an apt-get update now you will probably get an error like this:

W: GPG error: http://ppa.launchpad.net raring Release: The following signatures couldn't be verified because the public key is not available: NO_PUBKEY 6D975C4791E7EE5E

Add the key like this, replacing the key at the end of the command with the one from your previous key error output.

sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys 
6D975C4791E7EE5E

You should be able to update again without errors.