New Ubuntu 11.04

[swarfendor437 14]

Mandrake actually. Even now, I believe.

 

My mistake (your fault! - only joking!). Yes, I meant Mandrake. I really liked their 2007 edition with 'metal plate' splashcreen and glowing reflective blue spheres during boot - such a shame usb dongles didn't work with it. I did install 2010.1 KDE a few months back but when I installed the en-GB locale wireless stopped working! Still a nice simple distro though.

 

swarfendor43

[swarfendor437 14]

Plus with smaller distros, you're not at the mercy of a parent company and the whims of executives. Look at how Suse has now been sold to Attachmate and could (potentially) end up finished. Look at the mismanagement of Mandriva and the mess it's been in. There's loads of examples. But community based distros are still with us because they are driven by a passion for the OS and for Linux, and care for the users.

 

Well at least 'we' did get something new in computing. I always found it odd how the founder of Mandrake (Gaël Duval) could be sacked by a CEO. It turned out well for him in producing an outstanding product like Ulteo.

 

swarfendor43

[Sarkysod 10]

I have after 48 hours managed to download and install Ubuntu 11.04, it's been a challenge! At boot up, it kept sticking at a battery check prompt. An hours search on the Ubuntu forums led me to reinstall the Nvidia drivers via command line. I then booted up with no problems, got to the unity desktop, the after all of 2 minutes, went straight back to classic desktop.

Why are Ubuntu trying to dumb down the desktop? or is it just me?

[AJ sheffield 11]

Looks good, but I've moved to Opensuse with Gnome 3. And it's absolutely brilliant.

 

I like Ubuntu and I like the look of Unity, but there are a number of bugs that make it impossible for me to continue using it until they're fixed. Plus, I think Gnome 3 is better than Unity personally.

 

I recently switched to RM420 Ethereal and its excellent, much better than Linux Apoidea and KS karmann 900.

[swarfendor437 14]

I have after 48 hours managed to download and install Ubuntu 11.04, it's been a challenge! At boot up, it kept sticking at a battery check prompt. An hours search on the Ubuntu forums led me to reinstall the Nvidia drivers via command line. I then booted up with no problems, got to the unity desktop, the after all of 2 minutes, went straight back to classic desktop.

Why are Ubuntu trying to dumb down the desktop? or is it just me?

 

Apparently, someone who I know who likes it, is that it is trying to standardise things between platforms - apparently everything synchronizes between desktop and netbook/laptops really well and everything is in the same place between machines. Personally I think Ubuntu is pandering to the i-crowd - the bad news is that all desktops, and more specifically Gnome, will no longer be available - picked up a Linux Mag for a quick browse yesterday - interview with Mark Shuttleworth stated that there is no intention to have Gnome in any future releases - it will be Unity and nothing else - possibly why Linux Mint has left for Debian. Will be intersting to see what future releases of Zorin will do. That said if it is possible to put Gnome on BSD I wonder if it is possible to just put Gnome on whatever GNU/Linux kernel Unity is based on?

Edited May 1, 2011 by swarfendor43
incomplete sentence

[RyoHazuki 10]

I'm a bit confused then because isn't Unity running off Gnome 2? What, are they forking Gnome 2?

 

Anyway, after Opensuse being so great it went and ruined it with a kernel upgrade that killed my Nvidia. I didn't fancy fixing it, as I'd downloaded Ubuntu 11.04 and have decided to have a play. Thus far, it is to my liking, and I don't think there's anything dumbed down at all. If anything it's more complex, but it isn't really.

 

I do prefer Gnome 3. It just gets out of your way, whereas this seems to be vying for your attention all the time. But on balance I like them both. I'll stick with this for a bit and see how it goes.

[RyoHazuki 10]

Plus I'm sure I read somewhere that Jono Bacon said "Unity is not Gnome Shell, but a shell for Gnome" and that they don't intend for it to replace Gnome, but that it was instead a new portal for looking at "the awesome Gnome platform".

 

 

I do understand what you are getting at though. They can't continue with Gnome 2 if Gnome are no longer developing for it. But I dunno where that leaves Unity...

[SpiderPete 10]

I havent taken the plunge yet with 11.04, sticking with 10.10 for the moment.

[RyoHazuki 10]

Well I'm really getting used to the new layout now, and have to say I think it's very nice. The Unity bar in particular is very useful indeed, and I use it much like I did the AWN dock, and I'm getting to grips with the shortcuts and whatnot. It's a pity there's been such an overreaction to the change, but it's not that surprising I suppose. But yeah I love it.

[ashleybunker 10]

any one know if they have sort out touch screen interface as have a Dell Duo

[Tony Erikson 10]

Well I'm really getting used to the new layout now, and have to say I think it's very nice. The Unity bar in particular is very useful indeed, and I use it much like I did the AWN dock, and I'm getting to grips with the shortcuts and whatnot. It's a pity there's been such an overreaction to the change, but it's not that surprising I suppose. But yeah I love it.

 

For the first couple of hours I was grumpy. I really didn't fancy having to learn how to find my files again. Towards the end of the day I grew to like it. It gets better the more you use it. I'm not happy that the unity of the menu bar means I can't yet open a new tab with middle click in Firefox but it's hardly a killer.

 

All in all I like it and I shall be sticking with it.

[RyoHazuki 10]

For the first couple of hours I was grumpy...

 

I can relate to that! I'm fine now though.

 

The problem I have with Unity isn't so much the new environment, but how it was communicated. They could have done the same as Gnome 3 and set up some cool videos on their website just before launch detailing the new Unity DE. The Gnome 3 team did just that, and I watched all those videos and felt like I knew all about it before I'd even tried it. They made it very approachable.

 

I think Unity will prove to be very successful in the long run, but I would like to see them adopt the idea of friendly tutorial videos on the main Ubuntu site in the short term.