Wired internet not working in Xubuntu 12.0.4

You have assigned static IP address to your xubuntu machine or (virtual machine) using /etc/networks/interfaces.
You tried ifconfig and it gives you your IP address. You can access other computers on your local network but you have no internet connection.
Maybe the reason is your machine can not find DNS server to access internet.

a) Click "Network Manager" icon on top right corner.
b) Select 'Connection Information'. If disabled, then there is no active connection.

Chech your ip address

$ifconfig eth0(or eth1)

if no ip is assigned then try assigning static ip address from 'Network manager' or choose DHCP option for automatic ip address assignment. Automatic IP will be re-assigned on every system boot.
try

$ping -c 3 www.google.com

If it says "can't reach address"  then try followwing steps:

1) Binding DNS server to our machine.

$sudo dhclient eth0

 2) check DNS

$cat /etc/resolv.conf

It should have one-or-two IP addresses written and you should be able to access internet now.

Install desktop environment (GUI) on Ubuntu Server 12.04

You know after you install ubuntu server it won't have graphical user interface. Most of the time you won't need one, why you installed it in the first place. To make system as light as possible to run only essential services like web-server, database-server, etc. But sometimes you might change your mind and you server application with graphical user interface.
You have quite many options to choose for graphical desktop.

Installing KDE-based desktop options:

1st update your system:

$ sudo apt-get update

In case you want to install packages released for newer version of ubuntu then you might wanna add baclport repositories. But this not advised and my render your system unstable.

Adding backport repo:

$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kubuntu-ppa/backports

Now we have several options

$ sudo apt-get install kubuntu-desktop
or
$ sudo apt-get install kde-standard
or
$ sudo apt-get install kde-full
or
$ sudo apt-get install plasma-desktop
or
$ sudo apt-get install kde-plasma-desktop

kde-plasma-desktop,plasma-desktop are more lightweight compared to full versions, of course.

Using apt tool in Ubuntu Server 12.04

By default after you install Ubuntu Server 12.04 'add-apt-repository' command won't be available so you can't add additional PPA repository address.

You should try following commands:

sudo apt-get install python-software-properties
sudo apt-get install software-properties-common

now you can add new repo address


example)

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-typicalreponame/ppa

About me

Hello, my name is Shavkat.
I created this blog to share tips, notes, shortcuts, workarounds to problems and other material related to programming, porting, software design, coding, setup, etc. on Windows and Linux OS platforms. Mainly focusing on working with and development using cross-platform tools.