As with most Linux distros or Open-Source programs, there are several easter eggs in them, the hard part is finding them. We've done the work of searching the net for those that we could find, and here they are. These easter eggs are not just for Ubuntu but will work on most distributions, however some may involve downloading additional programs like apt-get.

1. The Book of Mozilla
Open a Firefox, Mozilla, or Netscape tab or window, and type: “about:mozilla” in the URL field. You will get a message from the book of Mozilla, depending on your version, you will get 1 of 3 passages from here: http://www.mozilla.org/book/

It is said that if it's done in Internet Explorer that it will give a blue screen similar to the wonderful BSOD.

2. Hidden Release Names
These funny “Ubuntu names” are stored in your Ubuntu kernel documentation files:

jonathan@highvoltage-t42 $ zcat /usr/share/doc/linux-image-`uname -r`/changelog.Debian.gz | egrep -e "Release"
The "Ben got a PowerBook for Christmas" Release.
The "Quickest re-release ever" Release
The "Oh crap, what did I get myself into?" Release.
The "Welcome Ben!" Release.
The "Morose Mungbean" Release.
The "Laughing Lentil" Release.
...

There’s also:

jonathan@highvoltage-t42 $ zgrep "The.*Release" /usr/share/doc/dpkg/changelog.Debian.gz
The "Good, clean fun" Release.
The "Bully's Special Prize" Release.
The "On like Donkey Kong" Release.
The "In like Flynn" Release.
The "Maidenhead Creeping Water Plant" Release.
The "Just kidding about the God part" Release.
The "Flatulent Elm of West Ruislip" Release.
The "? ????????????" Release.
...

3. OpenOffice.org Star Wars + More
Star Wars is only one of the games that are added in OO.o, with a simple search around the net you'd be suprised by how many extras there are. This will work across distributions and even on window$ and on NeoOffice on Macintosh.

Open up OpenOffice.org2 Calc, then enter:
=Game(”StarWars”)
in any cell and press enter!

Also, try the Tic-Tac-Toe Easter Egg in OpenOffice:
in a cell outside of the range A1:C3 type:

=Game(A1:C3;"TicTacToe")
(Hint: make a larger merged cell outside of that range, and select to wrap the text in it, to see the instructions)

Check out http://wiki.(...)ter_Eggs for more.

4. Apt-Get Fun
Apt-get and aptitude both have some nice little easter eggs, you have to work a little harder to get aptitude to cooperate. Note: The text in italics is what you type in at the termianl and the text after it is the response you get.

Open a terminal and run the following:

apt-get moo

(__)
(oo)
/——\/
/ | ||
* /\—/\
~~ ~~
….”Have you mooed today?”…


aptitude help
This aptitude does not have Super Cow Powers.

aptitude moo
There are no Easter Eggs in this program.

aptitude -v moo
There really are no Easter Eggs in this program.

aptitude -vv moo
Didn’t I already tell you that there are no Easter Eggs in this program?

aptitude -vvv moo
Stop it!

aptitude -vvvv moo
Okay, okay, if I give you an Easter Egg, will you go away?

aptitude -vvvvv moo
All right, you win.

/—-\
——-/ \
/ \
/ |
—————–/ ——–\
———————————————-

aptitude -vvvvvv moo
What is it? It's an elephant being eaten by a snake, of course.

This is a reference to Antoine de St. Exupery's "The Little Prince"

5. Gnome Fun
Under Gnome, press Alt+F2 (to execute a command), and then, type: "free the fish" (without the quotation marks of course).
You can also open the About Panels dialog box and press the "f" key three times.
The fish(Wanda) will then appear on the screen and will keep moving around. If you click on wanda she will swim offscreen and come back a short time later. To get rid of her you can press Alt + F2 and type "pkill gnome-panel" without the quotes. Your bars will disappear and then come back later.

Again, press Alt+F2 and type "gegls from outer space" (without the quotation marks of course). The result is a space invaders game but with cows


I hope you enjoy these easter eggs, if you have any more, feel free to post them in the comments section and I'll add them in!

Sources:
http://jonathancarter.co.za/?p=25
http://swobo(...)ives/364
http://www.eeggs.com/items/43172.html
http://julip(...)ggs.html

Thanks To:
John
EvanCarroll
alucardX
Galaad2

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