Objective
The objective is to install Gnome Shell Extensions from ZIP file using command line on Ubuntu 18.04 Bionic Beaver Linux. The installation of Gnome Shell Extensions from ZIP file using command line can be considered as an alternative to a standard way of Gnome Shell Extensions installation.
Operating System and Software Versions
- Operating System: – Ubuntu 18.04 Bionic Beaver
- Software: – GNOME Shell 3.26.2 or higher
Requirements
Apart of the install GNOME Shell there are no special requirements
Conventions
- # – requires given linux commands to be executed with root privileges either directly as a root user or by use of
sudocommand - $ – requires given linux commands to be executed as a regular non-privileged user
Other Versions of this Tutorial
Instructions
Download Gnome Extension
Let’s start by downloading a Gnome Extension you wish to install. As an example, in this tutorial we will install OpenWeather Gnome extension. Open up terminal and check your Gnome Shell version:
$ gnome-shell --version GNOME Shell 3.26.2
Select an appropriate gnome shell version and extensions version:
The extension’s zip file has been downloaded into Downloads directory:
$ ls ~/Downloads/ openweather-extension@jenslody.de.v94.shell-extension.zip
Obtain Extension UUID
The following linux command will read included metadata.json file to retrieve extension’s UUID:
$ unzip -c Downloads/openweather-extension@jenslody.de.v94.shell-extension.zip metadata.json | grep uuid | cut -d \" -f4 openweather-extension@jenslody.de
The UUID of your extension is openweather-extension@jenslody.de.
Create Destination Directory
Create a new directory into which we will unzip the content of the previously downloaded gnome extension. Make sure to change the directory name with the UUID of your Gnome extension:
$ mkdir -p ~/.local/share/gnome-shell/extensions/openweather-extension@jenslody.de
Unzip Gnome Extension
Now it is time to Unzip Gnome extension into previously created directory:
$ unzip -q Downloads/openweather-extension@jenslody.de.v94.shell-extension.zip -d ~/.local/share/gnome-shell/extensions/openweather-extension@jenslody.de/
Enable Gnome Extension
Next, enable the newly installed extension:
$ gnome-shell-extension-tool -e openweather-extension@jenslody.de 'openweather-extension@jenslody.de' is now enabled.
What has left is to restart gnome-shell. At the time of writing I did not find any reasonable non-intrusive way of restarting gnome shell on Wayland apart of login out and login back in. If you have some tips please leave them using below comment section.
