I wrote a post a while back about getting Microphones and Skype working in Ubuntu. This has been one of my most viewed posts, and as Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon) is about to be released, I thought I would update my previous post.

Turning on the Microphone
Getting the microphone working in Ubuntu 7.10, was really easy, I did the following:

• Plugged the Microphone in.
• Double clicked on the volume icon in the panel.
• Clicked Edit then, Preferences.
• Ticked the Microphone, Mic boost, and Capture boxes.
• Once they were ticked a Recording/Capture tab and a Switches/Options tab appeared in the volume control panel.
• I went through each volume setting and made sure nothing was turned down or muted.
• In the Switches/Options tab select Mic Boost.

Done, the microphone worked just fine, I tested the Mic using the Sound Recorder tool found in: Applications -> Sound and Video -> Sound Recorder

Installing Skype

• Add the Skype repository (If you don’t know how to add repositories please see: Repositories/Ubuntu) deb http://download.skype.com/linux/repos/debian/ stable non-free
• Reloaded or updated the package information
• Install Skype: # sudo apt-get install skype

Security and Skype
I no longer have the need to use Skype, however there is a security problem with Skype running on Linux, for more information please see: http://forum.skype.com/index.php?showtopic=95261

I suggest using AppArmor, (which is now a default application on Ubuntu 7.10) to create a security profile for Skype.