Note: The legacy Skype for Linux application (v4.*) is now discontinued and was removed from Canonical’s partner repositories, so this question and its answers are obsolete. Please refer to a newer answer of our canonical Skype installation question.
Skype 4.3 is just released with considerable improvements. As a regular Skype user I want to use the latest Skype on my Ubuntu 14.04, but there is no updates from Update Manager. Even in Skype website only Skype 4.3 is available only for Ubuntu 12.04. Is there anyway to use this latest Skype on Ubuntu 14.04 or how much we have to wait for the update?
Best Answer
Step 1: Remove previous version.
It is Important if you installed older version of Skype on your Ubuntu, Clear the old Skype folder before installing latest version. Then clear that by using:
Step 2: Preparing to Installing Skype.
Users of 64-bit Ubuntu, should enable MultiArch if it isn't already enabled by running the command
Update repositories and "updates" list:
Optional, install
GDebi
(see below):Step 3: Installing Skype
Method 1: Download and install from file
Method 2: Install Skype from Canonical Partner Repository
So add the Canonical Partner Repository to "updates" list by following the command:
Then install Skype via the Software-Center or via the Terminal.
source
Why you need to install gdebi instead of using dpkg or Ubuntu software center.
dpkg (for Debian package) is a software tool from the command line is responsible for installing, creating, deleting, and managing Debian (packets deb), the type of packets processed by Ubuntu. It also allows the Debian package management from sources outside the apt repositories.
To install packages,
dpkg
has a graphical interface,gdebi
, you can use if you prefer to avoid the command line.gdebi is an application installation and management of Debian (.deb) packages. This is a utility that works both in graphic mode console and allow the installation of packages outside of APT deposits : from a website, CD-ROM, portable media, etc. It has the same functionality as
apt-get
orUbuntu Software Center
: it ensures that the package to be installed is compatible with the version and architecture of the Ubuntu system in which you try to install it, and also ensures that all dependencies required by the package are satisfied. Otherwise, the dependencies are downloaded from the Internet. Using tabs,gdebi
also provides access to important information such as folder paths in which to install the various files from .deb package.Finally
gdebi
is a lightweight deb packages installer which was the default in Ubuntu Desktop. Now Ubuntu uses Ubuntu Software Center which is slow and sometimes you getThe package is of bad quality
error.Read more about
GDebi
:To install a package you have downloaded from a website, rather than from a software repository. These packages are called .deb files. Because they may have been created for a different Linux distribution, you might find that there's dependency issues with Ubuntu, meaning that they may be uninstallable.
gdebi
is a simple tool to install .deb files. It has a graphical user interface but can also be used in your terminal. It lets you install local deb packages resolving and installing its dependencies.. It automatically checks packages for their dependencies and will try to download them from the Ubuntu software repositories if possible. You may first need to installgdebi
- simply install thegdebi
package using one of the package managers likedkpg
,Synaptic
or open a Terminal and typesudo apt-get install gdebi
. Once you have installedgdebi
, use the File Browser to find the package you want to install.Double-click the package to open it with
gdebi
. If all dependencies have been met for the selected package, simply click theInstall package
button to install it.gdebi
will warn you if there are unmet dependencies, which means that there's dependencies that aren't resolved in the repositories that you're using.