Label making software that works

So, I buy these Avery return address labels, take them home and download the template from their website. The problem with those nice Avery label templates that you get from their site is that they’re designed to be used with MS Word. Using Ubuntu, I opened this template in Open Office, thinking it would work just fine. My labels ended up printing a little bit askew, and I only had about 40 usable labels out of 60. Recently I found the solution to my problem on getdeb.net, when I came across gLabels. It’s a very lightweight program designed to work with most major label sheets that can create labels and business cards. I tried it out with every different label that I use, and it works perfectly!

Here’s how to install it, open up a terminal and enter this command:

sudo apt-get install glabels

This will installl the 2 packages necessary for gLabels to function, glabels, and glabels-data. Now you can find gLabels Label Designer in the Office menu. This method works great if you have an internet connection. It’s a small download, so even over a dial up connection (like me) it won’t take too long. But what if you don’t have an internet connection at all? If you’re reading this you must have access to the internet at work, or a friend’s house. In that case, you can download gLabels here. Make sure to download both packages, glabels & glabels-data. Put them on a USB flash drive, and then from that onto your internet-less Ubuntu desktop at home. Copy them to your desktop, and then double-click on them to install them. Here’s what that looks like…

Save the file

Save both files to your USB flash drive, then copy them onto your desktop at home.

Double-click on each file and you’ll see this box. Click on Install Package to complete the installation. That’s it!

Here’s what you can expect…

Opening Screen

Choosing a label template

Designing your new label