Adding Avant Window Navigator to your Ubuntu install

Avant Window Navigator, or AWN is a neat little dock that sits at the base of your monitor and looks exceedingly nice. It’s a great addition to your compiz-fusion install (in fact, you need compiz or something like it running for AWN to work).

Getting it isn’t all that hard either - especially with this step by step guide that will show you how.

Once you’ve got your desktop effects up and running, it’s time to improve things with AWN. Let’s open a terminal session (Applications-> Accessories-> Terminal) and do a little light hacking. We’re going to update your sources.list file so you can download the necessary bits for AWN. In your terminal type the following to back up your sources.list file and then edit it:

sudo cp /etc/apt/sources.list /etc/apt/sources.list.bak

gksu gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

Gedit will now be open with your sources.list file. Head down to the bottom and add this:

deb http://download.tuxfamily.org/syzygy42 feisty avant-window-navigator

deb-src http://download.tuxfamily.org/syzygy42 feisty avant-window-navigator

Now save your sources.list file and exit out of gedit. Now let’s add the public key so you can download what you need:

wget http://download.tuxfamily.org/syzygy42/8434D43A.gpg -O- | sudo apt-key add -

rm 8434D43A.gpg

Now for updating and installing:

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install avant-window-navigator-svn

Once finished, AWN is installed.

Now getting it to run is simpler. Go to System-> Preferences-> Sessions and on the default tab (Startup Programs) click the Add button. In the Name field enter ‘AWN’. The command is:

avant-window-navigator

You can leave the comment blank. Click the OK button and AWN will start automatically once you restart your computer.

If you want to add applications (as I’ve added Firefox and Thunderbird) simply go to your Applications menu, find the app you want to add, and drag it to your AWN bar.

To modify your setttings, go to System-> Preferences-> Awn Manager.

That’s it. You’re set to go with AWN.