Install Electrum (Linux) [solved]

[bob123]

The installation took place correctly and the server is connected, on the other hand, I do not see an icon and I have to click on the file to be executed to open the application.

An AppImage is similar to a portable executable on windows. There is no installation.
And if you want to have an icon on your desktop, you'll have to create one yourself (as mentioned by NotATether).

switch to windows. if you have no technical knowledge and aren't willing to learn then you have no business using ubuntu.

Instead of discouraging people from using a superior operating system and moving back to a spyware full of vulnerabilities, i'd rather recommend him to start learning about his OS.
Everyone started with little to no technical knowledge. Just because he has no technical knowledge regarding ubuntu yet, it doesn't mean that he isn't willing to learn.

Or use linux distro that aimed for beginner (who willing learn a bit) such as Zorin OS or Linux Mint (with Cinnamon DE).

Ubuntu actually is the beginner OS.

[NotATether]

The installation took place correctly and the server is connected, on the other hand, I do not see an icon and I have to click on the file to be executed to open the application.

As far as I can remember, AppImage does not require any installation. You seems to have successfully make it executable which is why you can run the app. No icon is expected and is not a big problem imo.

This particular AppImage that Electrum distributes has an icon inside the bundle, in fact that's where I pulled the icon in my previous post from. An AppImage is just a compressed squashfs filesystem, when its ran it's decompressed and mounted with FUSE and invoked like any other Linux program. Most AppImages are set up to display an icon the dev puts inside the bundle.

Or use linux distro that aimed for beginner (who willing learn a bit) such as Zorin OS or Linux Mint (with Cinnamon DE).

Ubuntu actually is the beginner OS.

If someone needs hand-holding to use an operating system then they should not be running an obscure Linux distro because there are few online tutorials available for them. There seems to be a scarcity of tutorials even for established distributions like Gentoo and Arch Linux.

Most tutorials are written for Ubuntu GNOME, which is what I'm assuming OP is using as that's the default configuration of Ubuntu (There is also less-used K/X/Lubuntu).

[joniboini]

This particular AppImage that Electrum distributes has an icon inside the bundle, in fact that's where I pulled the icon in my previous post from.

My bad, I was under the impression that what OP meant by "icon" is a "shortcut on desktop", which I think is not created by default.

[bob123]

I know, but IMO GNOME is less user friendly compared with other DE (such as Cinnamon and KDE) for user who used Windows previously.

True. I'd also always recommend KDE and/or Cinnamon for people coming from windows.

Arch Linux is one of distro that have many (with good quality control) tutorial at https://wiki.archlinux.org/. Even if i don't use Arch Linux, there are few problems that i solved by using guide from Arch Linux wiki.

It is probably the distro with the best wiki available.
But on the other hand, there are less step-by-step tutorials for Arch. Ubuntu (and therefore also debian) seems to be the best distro for newcomers since there are tons of step-by-step guides on how to achieve specific things.

[Xillis]

The installation took place correctly and the server is connected, on the other hand, I do not see an icon and I have to click on the file to be executed to open the application.

Use the .desktop file I created at how to create a shortcut to electrum btc wallet to make the shortcut.

1. Create an empty text file called electrum.desktop (save it inside your home folder, like /home/ophelie

2. Paste the following contents in this file, and save it:

Code:

[Desktop Entry]
Comment=Lightweight Bitcoin Client
Exec=/home/ophelie/electrum-4.0.3-x86_64.AppImage %u
GenericName[en_US]=Bitcoin Wallet
GenericName=Bitcoin Wallet
Icon=/home/ophelie/electrum.png
Name[en_US]=Electrum Bitcoin Wallet
Name=Electrum Bitcoin Wallet
Categories=Office;Finance;Network;
StartupNotify=true
StartupWMClass=electrum
Terminal=false
Type=Application
MimeType=x-scheme-handler/bitcoin;

For the icon to work, you need to download it from https://i.imgur.com/zx4CmVi.png to your Home folder and rename it to electrum.png

3. Open a terminal and run the following command to create a shortcut:

Code:

desktop-file-install --dir=$HOME/.local/share/applications electrum.desktop

This installs the shortcut on Activities or any other start menu you are using. It only installs it for the current users, not for other users that might use the computer (I assume you are the only user of your computer).

Now you should be able to access Electrum by going to Activities menu and clicking on Electrum Bitcoin Wallet, or it might be under Office > Electrum Bitcoin Wallet.

Do not move the electrum-4.0.3-x86_64.AppImage or electrum.png file. If you move the AppImage, then the shortcut will no longer work, it will try to run electrum at a folder it's not located in. If you move the Electrum icon, then it won't show an icon anymore. If keeping the files in the home folder is a nuisance for you, I can work out a solution that puts the files in the hidden .local folder.

4. The electrum.desktop file you created earlier is no longer needed (it made a copy of it in a system folder), you can safely delete the one you created.

If you ever want to delete the shortcut, just run in a terminal:

Code:

rm ~/.local/share/applications/electrum.desktop

and then the shortcut will be gone.

My result :

Code:

ophelie@ophelie-Lenovo-G70-80:~$ desktop-file-install --dir=$HOME/.local/share/applications electrum.desktop
electrum.desktop: warning: key "MimeType" is a list and does not have a semicolon as trailing character, fixing
ophelie@ophelie-Lenovo-G70-80:~$ 

I followed the tutorial, but I think it didn't work because I put the file in a folder, but even after moving the file to the "home" folder, the icon still doesn't appear . Now that I have read that air is not installed by default, I understand better why I am not missing any and so it was normal. I'll take one last instruction, but after that if it still doesn't work, that's okay as long as the app is up and running.

And one last question before closing the topic, which trusted server do you recommend? I read in other forums that fake servers steal users' bitcoins for those who have chosen the automatic option. Thank you

[NotATether]

I followed the tutorial, but I think it didn't work because I put the file in a folder, but even after moving the file to the "home" folder, the icon still doesn't appear . Now that I have read that air is not installed by default, I understand better why I am not missing any and so it was normal. I'll take one last instruction, but after that if it still doesn't work, that's okay as long as the app is up and running.

  What do you mean by air? Is that an icon theme or something?

Anyway, it shouldn't matter because if a desktop icon doesn't appear, it means that /home/ophelie/electrum.png did not exist when you ran desktop-file-install, so after you make sure that file exists, the desktop file needs to be removed and then installed again.

First delete the desktop file:

Code:

rm ~/.local/share/applications/electrum.desktop

Then remove it from Ubuntu's cache so that it disappears from the menus:

Code:

xdg-desktop-menu forceupdate

Then wait for a few seconds, during this time create the electrum.png image in the home folder again, and then install the desktop file again:

Code:

desktop-file-install --dir=$HOME/.local/share/applications electrum.desktop

I hope this helps you show the icon.

[BitMaxz]

I followed the tutorial, but I think it didn't work because I put the file in a folder, but even after moving the file to the "home" folder, the icon still doesn't appear . Now that I have read that air is not installed by default, I understand better why I am not missing any and so it was normal. I'll take one last instruction, but after that if it still doesn't work, that's okay as long as the app is up and running.

And one last question before closing the topic, which trusted server do you recommend? I read in other forums that fake servers steal users' bitcoins for those who have chosen the automatic option. Thank you

If you already have electrum.desktop under desktop with [Desktop Entry] that was suggested above you might also need to change shortcut permission.
Use this code below to change its permission.

Code:

chmod +x ~/Desktop/electrum.desktop

About servers, I think you can use any server available on Electrum just make sure that you are using a latest version which is Electrum 4.0.3 lower than 3.3.4 are vulnerable to phishing attacks.

[Xillis]

I use the Google Translate tool to understand the discussion and sometimes the message is poorly translated and forms inconsistent sentences. I wanted to talk about an icon, but google translated it as air.

For controlling :

Code:

rm ~ / .local / share / applications / electrum.desktop

I get this result:

Code:

ophelie@ophelie-Lenovo-G70-80:~$ rm ~ / .local / share / applications / electrum.desktop
rm: impossible de supprimer '/home/ophelie': est un dossier
rm: impossible de supprimer '/': est un dossier
rm: impossible de supprimer '.local': est un dossier
rm: impossible de supprimer '/': est un dossier
rm: impossible de supprimer 'share': Aucun fichier ou dossier de ce type
rm: impossible de supprimer '/': est un dossier
rm: impossible de supprimer 'applications': Aucun fichier ou dossier de ce type
rm: impossible de supprimer '/': est un dossier
ophelie@ophelie-Lenovo-G70-80:~$ 

For controlling :

Code:

chmod + x ~ / Desktop / electrum.desktop

I get this result :

Code:

ophelie@ophelie-Lenovo-G70-80:~$ chmod +x ~/Desktop/electrum.desktop
chmod: impossible d'accéder à '/home/ophelie/Desktop/electrum.desktop': Aucun fichier ou dossier de ce type
ophelie@ophelie-Lenovo-G70-80:~$ 

 

[NotATether]

I use the Google Translate tool to understand the discussion and sometimes the message is poorly translated and forms inconsistent sentences. I wanted to talk about an icon, but google translated it as air.

Oh dear   I think I know why the commands all have errors when you run them. It's because Google Translate is putting spaces all over the code blocks. So turn off Google Translate while you copy code, and then you can turn it back on.



Sometimes, if the commands are incorrectly written, like what Google did above, they can do dangerous things!

The best way for me to troubleshoot this is if I install an Ubuntu 16.04 virtual machine in Virtualbox and try to copy your computer setup. Then I can diagnose exactly why it's not working as intended. Hopefully my test Ubuntu will be ready in a few hours, I will get back to you when it's complete.


So the testing machine is up, and after running my commands it made a shortcut with icon. I think that how you installed it, you ran the command before copying the icon to the home folder. That's not the correct order. You need to copy the icon to the home folder before running the commands. So copy the icon if it's not already there, and once that's done,  I pasted the following commands on my Github:

Code:

rm ~/.local/share/applications/electrum.desktop

Code:

xdg-desktop-menu forceupdate

Code:

desktop-file-install --dir=$HOME/.local/share/applications electrum.desktop

Copy the commands from the github link, so Google Translate doesn't interfere with them. Don't copy from these code blocks here, and this will be easier on you hopefully.

[HCP]

For controlling :

Code:

rm ~ / .local / share / applications / electrum.desktop

I get this result:

Code:

ophelie@ophelie-Lenovo-G70-80:~$ rm ~ / .local / share / applications / electrum.desktop
rm: impossible de supprimer '/home/ophelie': est un dossier
rm: impossible de supprimer '/': est un dossier
rm: impossible de supprimer '.local': est un dossier
rm: impossible de supprimer '/': est un dossier
rm: impossible de supprimer 'share': Aucun fichier ou dossier de ce type
rm: impossible de supprimer '/': est un dossier
rm: impossible de supprimer 'applications': Aucun fichier ou dossier de ce type
rm: impossible de supprimer '/': est un dossier
ophelie@ophelie-Lenovo-G70-80:~$ 

Hopefully something you won't need Google Translate for:

Correct:

Code:

rm ~/.local/share/applications/electrum.desktop

Incorrect:

Code:

rm ~ / .local / share / applications / electrum.desktop

extra space characters in commands will break things! ("des espaces supplémentaires dans les commandes provoqueront des erreurs")

[bob123]

OP, you have been lucky to not break your system with the rm command.
You could have easily deleted files necessary for your operating system to work.

We have 2 pages in this thread already, and with how you copy/paste commands into your terminal, please let me say.. don't use linux (yet).
Copy/pasting commands from the internet without actually knowing what they do is very dangerous.

Since you have electrum installed yet, what about learning how to use linux? You don't need a pointy-clicky icon to start electrum. You can simply use the command line.
There is no reason to break your system just to get a icon to double-click.

My recommendation would be to start electrum via the command line and learn how to use linux before copy/pasting commands with additional spaces etc.. You will break your system this way.

[NotATether]

Yeah if all this is too much to understand, just forget about the icon and electrum.desktop file. You managed to get the electrum AppImage working and you can easily run that by double-clicking, and that's good enough. No hard feelings OP.

[NotATether]

For controlling :

Code:

rm ~ / .local / share / applications / electrum.desktop

You're one step away from destroying the operating system.

Yeah if all this is too much to understand, just forget about the icon and electrum.desktop file. You managed to get the electrum AppImage working and you can easily run that by double-clicking, and that's good enough. No hard feelings OP.

I know right, if OP want something that resemble icon/shortcut, OP could move Electrum AppImage to desktop and double click it.

Now I feel bad about suggesting him to use the rm command to uninstall the desktop file, clearly Linux should have an easier way to install and remove desktop files like a GUI program for that. I mean, we have settings for firewall and display resolution among other things specifically so users don't risk breaking their setups by typing terminal commands from the internet that they don't fully understand.

Desktop files should have their own settings widget to manage them.

I think we all should refrain from giving newbies commands to type if there's a chance the command could do dangerous things if type incorrectly, such as if someone's asking how to make a Live USB of linux, we shouldn't make them use the "dd" or "gparted" commands among others because those can also destroy partitions (I once broke a linux install on a laptop by deleting the root partition, which gparted in a LiveDVD labeled as unrecognized).

[bob123]

Now I feel bad about suggesting him to use the rm command to uninstall the desktop file, clearly Linux should have an easier way to install and remove desktop files like a GUI program for that.

There is.
Using a file browser together with a text editor is more than enough.

Desktop files should have their own settings widget to manage them.

What for? You could simply do that using a file browser to navigate and a text editor to create the .desktop file. If that is still too much and people need more pointy-clicky, windows seems to be the best option IMO.

I think we all should refrain from giving newbies commands to type if there's a chance the command could do dangerous things if type incorrectly, such as if someone's asking how to make a Live USB of linux, we shouldn't make them use the "dd" or "gparted" commands among others because those can also destroy partitions (I once broke a linux install on a laptop by deleting the root partition, which gparted in a LiveDVD labeled as unrecognized).

To be honestly, if done correctly, the command line is the fastet way to 1) describe how to solve something and 2) to actually achieve it yourself.

We could also refrain from giving step-by-step guides at all, because they already exist on the internet.
But those people are either too lazy to search for it or didn't find it. And then 4 commands are easy and fast posted here, which also helps others searching for it. Way better than saying "There are tutorials available, search for it".

[Xillis]

It's okay, you don't have to get there. Just warn like you did and I get the lesson.
I'm not going to keep trying to install the icon, it takes too much effort and time just for one icon. The software works well and this is the main thing, however, I will continue this topic because an update is available and they are important for security, but I did not succeed because I do not understand anything. I end up with a big folder with a bunch of files and I don't know which one to open to run the installation.

[NotATether]

It's okay, you don't have to get there. Just warn like you did and I get the lesson.
I'm not going to keep trying to install the icon, it takes too much effort and time just for one icon. The software works well and this is the main thing, however, I will continue this topic because an update is available and they are important for security, but I did not succeed because I do not understand anything. I end up with a big folder with a bunch of files and I don't know which one to open to run the installation.

New version Electrum 4.0.4 was released recently, yes. Just download the AppImage of that like you did with 4.0.3.

Code:

wget https://download.electrum.org/4.0.4/electrum-4.0.4-x86_64.AppImage
wget https://download.electrum.org/4.0.4/electrum-4.0.4-x86_64.AppImage.asc
chmod +x electrum-4.0.4-x86_64.AppImage
gpg --verify electrum-4.0.4-x86_64.AppImage.asc

The zip file that Electrum downloaded is also a release of the latest version Electrum 4.0.4, but it is not as easy to run as the AppImage.

In the future, when you want to download an Electrum update, you should go to https://electrum.org/#download and download the files that day "Linux Appimage signature". Then, you run the "gpg --verify" command on the .asc file, and then you run the "chmod +x" on the .AppImage file.

On linux, Electrum's update button doesn't replace the old version like on Windows. That's why it has to be downloaded again from the Electrum website.

[Xillis]

ok, I started the installation steps again and the update worked. I will put the subject in resolved and thank you for your dedication and patience.