How do I install the Ask Ubuntu Unity Lens, and how do I use it?

Question

I heard about the Ask Ubuntu Unity Lens over in the chat, and I was wondering how to install it. What are the step-by-step instructions to get it installed, activated and once that's done, how do I use it?

Answer 1

The Ask Ubuntu Lens is a way to search askubuntu.com via your desktop in Unity. You can search for anything on the site. Questions, tags, users, and badges all show up in the search results and then it will take you here.

Depending on your Ubuntu version:

For 12.04:

You can install the Ask Ubuntu Unity Lens via a PPA

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:askubuntu-tools/ppa    
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install unity-lens-askubuntu

Open up a terminal window and enter the above commands. Then, you need to log out and log back in for the lens to show up and work correctly.

For 11.10:

Open the Software Center, and then search for Ask Ubuntu

Or, you can install the unity-lens-askubuntu package through the terminal.

Note: for improved performance, you can also install the local data server with:

sudo apt-get install audataserver-proxy

For 11.04:

You can install the Ask Ubuntu Unity Lens via a PPA     sudo add-apt-repository ppa:askubuntu-tools/ppa    sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get install unity-place-askubuntu

Just open up a terminal window and enter the above commands. Then, you need to log out and log back (or run unity --replace) in for the lens to show up and work correctly.

You can click on the Ask Ubuntu icon on your launcher (for 11.04), or inside your dash in 11.10. To get a fully expanded lens or you can hit the Super-U keyboard shortcut to summon the lens, then ask your question:

11.10 version:

11:04 version:

You can also right click on the icon and get a quicklist of different sub searches if you only want to search for a specific thing:

You can find more info here.

• Report bugs here

Answer 2

For 11.04

There are a few special searches you can do. Search for au to quickly get a link to Ask Ubuntu (this also works in the global dash). Others are chat, for the Ask Ubuntu Chat, me (for your recent activity page), meta, and help (which will get you to this question).

You can also use the Lens to search any other stackexchange site via @-modifiers. An example search would be:

@wordpress file permissions

or

@so +pygtk about dialog

Where @so is short for stack overflow. This is (at the time of writing) the complete list of available sites:

@stackoverflow    @serverfault    @superuser       @webapps
@gaming           @webmasters     @cooking         @gamedev
@photo            @stats          @math            @diy
@gis              @tex            @askubuntu       @money
@english          @stackapps      @ux              @unix
@wordpress        @cstheory       @apple           @rpg
@bicycles         @programmers    @electronics     @android
@onstartups       @boardgames     @physics         @homebrew
@security         @writers        @audio           @graphicdesign
@dba              @scifi          @guitars         @codereview
@codegolf         @quant          @pm              @skeptics
@fitness          @drupal         @mechanics       @parenting
@sharepoint

Note that the lens will auto-update this list every time you re-boot, so, after your favourite beta site has been launched, it should appear soon.

For 11.10

Now that we have scopes, you can just click "Filter Results" and select another Stack Exchange network site.