Making video recordings of your screen can be very useful. If you’re trying to demo something to someone or just want to record something on your desktop, it can be an invaluable tool. One such program for recording your Linux (or other X11-based) desktop is Istanbul.

Istanbul is very easy to use and creates open standard Ogg Theora files that will play back on any modern Linux distribution (you can also get Ogg Theora software for other platforms too) . After installation, start the application.

You will see a small red circle in your system tray. Left-clicking this will start recording with the default settings. Once you’re done, you simply click the icon again to stop the recording.

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