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A Gut Check On Gutsy Gibbon
jammag writes "Linux pundit Bruce Byfield looked inside the pre-release of Gutsy Gibbon and found what he calls 'Windows thinking.' His article, Divining from the Entrails of Ubuntu's Gutsy Gibbon, notes that Ubuntu is the dominant distro, having achieved a level of success that might be leading to complacency. He opines: 'Only once or twice did I find a balance between accessibility to newcomers and a feature set for advanced users. At times, I wondered whether the popularity might be preventing Ubuntu from finishing some rough edges.'"
Hm, I guess it seems Gutsy Gibbon isn't quite up to stuff. Prolly oughta wait for the next edition, the more refined Hairy Hardon.
When read out loud, in a fruity "posh" voice. ;-)
My response? Open a shell.
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
Gutsy Gibbon sure can play guitar!
I hope this is not flamebait but what is it with these continually lame names of the releases? Gutsy Gibbon? Um, WTF? How does this say "Reliable, Trusted Operating System" to the user who is outside the geek circles?
- Zav - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of insensitive clods...
Well they've obviously become complacent about the name because it has "random adjective and animal generator" written all over it. Maybe they'll give it some actual effort next time when it comes up with Aroused Aardvark
Google's Super Secret Search Algorithm: SELECT @search_results FROM internet WHERE @search_results = 'good'
So Ubuntu is the closest thing to a Linux distro that can fight off the Windows, Mac OS X will do okay but it will still be fan boys who get that. So unless we all want to run windows for another decade or two, we gotta respect what Ubuntu is doing for Linux distros........(sniff and a tear)......all over the world!
To see a few of my Android apps goto: www.hartwired.com
According to the stats at www.distrowatch.org, something called PCLINUXOS is the number one distribution with Ubuntu a close second. Looks like somebody is giving them a run for their money.
Unhappy with *[Uu]buntu's way of installing, not leaving many choices for the "IT professional"?
Use the alternative LiveCD. Note you don't need to "secure the system", since the default install does not bind any sockets listening. I actually consider it one of Ubuntu's strongest feats that you are not facing any choice of package selection whatsoever, so you can be sure you will end up with a sanely organized system you can build upon, if you want, or just walk on with the preset choices.
Next hilarious thing on his list is the boot menu - if you're actually an advanced-enough user to know about the possibility of testing your memory at bootup, I figure you also know about how to hit Escape to have GRUB's full menu appear.
He's got one point on fonts, as there can never be enough fonts included in an install. I personally do like Gentium though, and consider freetype's font rendering as Ubuntu sports it very pleasing to the eye.
On page two, where he's going to whine about "Proliferating package managers", the author imho show severe lack of understanding concerning Debian-ish package management. Well, let there be a lightweight update-checking-utility that does not come up with the whole bunch of X11-windows that is synaptic. It's a good thing it's there - it uses the same backends as apt-get, aptitude, synpatic, dpkg, adept, whatthefuckever use, and it saves you from manually checking for updates every so often. So would you please stop being anal about it? Thanks.
Also on page 2: "At any rate, the only way to judge how useful a package might be is to use it yourself." Oh wow, movie at eleven. I won't even comment on this, Cpt. Obvious to the rescue.
Page 3 is about security, and once again tha author seems clueless to me. An "intruder" on a default Ubuntu system can pretty much by definition (due to the lack of running network-interfacing daemons) only be a local attacker with physical access to your machine. Well, in case of physical access you're hosed anyway.
The point in criticizing default group memberships for the "desktop"-class of users is also beyond me. Well, that is how UNIX tends to work, and if it weren't for the desktop user to be able to, e. g., adjust the sound system's mixer levels or burn a CD, what's left for "desktop" usage to be done? No access via `sudo` means no (write-)access to other account's files and data. Besides, if you let people you don't trust gain local access to a machine via their very own personal account, you should probably check for your very own mental sanity/security first.
My point is, if Ubuntu actually behaved like he now states he'd like it to in his article, it'd be a flamefest of a different kind: namely criticizing how Ubuntu lacked in "usability", and how it would shy away "novice users".
Ubuntu is a very fine choice for someone starting out with GNU/Linux or computers all together. It's also a fine choice for someone more knowledgeable, since it's perfectly possible to stray away from the sane defaults the Ubuntu devs chose for the distro. If you happen to find your demands outstrip Ubuntu's capabilities, you're probably better off by creating a distribution of your own.
My 2 cent.
:%s/Open Source/Free Software/g
YTARY!
who gives ubuntu versions these crazy names?
Ubuntu isn't successful because it's an operating system for advanced users only (like Gentoo). It's successful due to being user friendly to people who are Windows users who are curious about Linux.
With Linux I've noticed that user control is inversely proportional to user-friendliness. Operating systems like Ubuntu are made with user-friendliness in mind and that comes at the price of user control. It's quick and easy to set-up and use which garners alot of favor from the Windows crowd.
Similarly, Gentoo gives the user complete control over what applications, drivers, daemons are installed but is by no means user-friendly.
The writer of TFA really did a whole lot of whining about how little control he had over the installation and initial software packages. What did he expect? It's Ubuntu.
The game.
I think the main problem the reviewer is having is that he wants thinks to be like linux used to be. The reason I like Ubuntu is that it tries to escape from that. For example:
- By default, the user never has to select any partitioning options, or even know what it is.
Well, most people don't know what partitioning is.
- Want to choose which software to install.
Once again, new linux users won't know the names of all the programs they might want. Ubuntu installs what I consider a reasonable selection. Talk of knowing exactly what is installed sounds more like server talk, for which you probably want Ubuntu server, which does install a much smaller selection of packages by default
- Doesn't send hundreds of confusing messages past at high speed on boot-up (me paraphrasing)
Well good, particularly because most start-ups have at least one thing which looks to the untrained eye like a failure
Other problems, including fonts, are possibly more valid. I'd be interested to know what an Ubuntu expert's opinion is on them.
Combination - fun iPhone puzzling
This article is another one spread over multiple pages, so you'd think that the print version might be sane.... but no, the print version is multiple pages, with many [blocked for me] adverts and a big grey navigation box at the bottom. I can only assume that the blocked ads are for shit like toner, ink and paper! Anyway, here's the article, minus the annoyances:
Divining from the Entrails of Ubuntu's Gutsy Gibbon
By Bruce Byfield
September 20, 2007
According to the 2007 DesktopLinux.com survey, Ubuntu is the distribution of choice for 30% of GNU/Linux users. The exact figure is questionable, but Ubuntu's dominance is not. For an increasing number of people, Ubuntu is GNU/Linux. Yet, looking at the pre-releases of Gutsy Gibbon, Ubuntu 7.10, I found myself becoming disturbed by the degree to which this popularity has translated into uncritical acceptance.
Make no mistake -- due to the energy that the Ubuntu community and Canonical, its corporate arm, have put into improving the desktop, this popularity is well-deserved. Yet, at the same time, I find myself wondering whether user-friendliness must inevitably mean discouraging users from exploring their systems or taking firm control over them. This question keep nagging me each time I installed, went through the selection of preloaded software, explored the desktop, installed new software, or examined security. Only once or twice did I find a balance between accessibility to newcomers and a feature set for advanced users. At times, too, I wondered whether the popularity might be preventing Ubuntu from finishing some rough edges.
Installation
Many releases ago, Ubuntu settled on installation from a Live CD. To begin the installation, you boot your computer with the CD in the drive, then click an icon to add Ubuntu to your hard drive.
Little has changed in the Gutsy Gibbon release. The installer opens with a warning that you are using a pre-release version that installation of might mean over-writing existing files, then leads you through an eight-step wizard.
To its credit, the installer makes adding an operating system to your hard drive as easy as it can probably be. However, while even novices are unlikely to have much trouble if they accept the defaults, straying beyond them is difficult. For instance, in the keyboard selection step, the only way to know the differences between two U.S. English International layouts or the classical, left hand, or right hand versions of the Dvorak keyboard is to know them beforehand, to research them on another computer, or to try each systematically in the field provided for the purpose.
Similarly, at the partitioner, if you choose the Guided option, you quickly discover that it's a misnomer. "Guided" really means automatic, and gives you no choice whatsoever. I can't help comparing this lack of choice unfavorably to Debian 4.0's presentation of different partitioning schemes that you can either accept or modify as you want.
The installer does a better job with Advanced options on the final screen, tucking away controls for choosing where to install the bootloader or participate in the package Popularity Contest a button-click away from the top level screen.
Yet, for all its convenience, what most characterizes the Ubuntu installer is the lack of choice it presents. Users cannot even choose the initial software to install. This lack is not only frustrating, but violates a main principle of security. After all, you can hardly secure a system if you do not know what is going on it.
Bootup and Desktop
Like the installer, the desktop in Gutsy Gibbon has changed only in minor ways from earlier versions of Ubuntu. And, in many ways, that's not a bad thing, because Ubuntu's default GNOME desktop has always been well-organized. Its menu avoids overwhelming users with choices, and its organization of panel applets or logout options into several categories helps you locate what you need more easily. Sensibly, too, Ubuntu continues to offer only two virtual w
I've got a mix of systems at home. Debian, Windows, etc..
/etc/X11 could get the LCD display to flip upside-down. Which in the long term was necessary for an under-cabinet mount. $40 for Pivot Pro and re-installing the original XP load was worth the headaches.
For a while my kitchen laptop (a 5 year old old Dell Inspiron) was running Ubuntu G.G. and I found it quite nice to use. This was my first desktop Linux system in about 4 years. It was responsive, easy to find things, and perfect for that application. (Lots of web browsing and some note taking.) I'd still be using it except...
Eventually, though, I had to install XP Home on the system. No amount of research, begging, pleading and tweaking in
Get off my lawn.
for boxes I push on others and find it more polished and much preferable to Ubuntu. Props to Shuttleworth (and Debian prior) for doing the heavy lifting, but big props to the Mint folks for making it really work. Personally, I use FreeBSD; the layout is sensible, POLA-based and I find ports much more up to date than any distro's included packages. Also, that mess that is Flash support doesn't bug me that much, so I don't miss it.
Ubuntu is very popular atm because it is very beginner friendly. Ubuntu seems to strive to make itself like Windows to attract more people. It is only a matter of time before Ubuntu looks and acts just like Windows.
Klingon Software is not released, it escapes, inflicting terrible damage onto the enemy as it does
Yeah, but Average Joe can't run OSX on the PC he already owns. He can run Ubuntu, though...
...sorta like that goofy startup with the weird name, what was it called again, oh ya, "google". WTH is "google", my boss will never go for that!
;)
PHBs, and the companies they run, who fixate on names instead of the engineering aspects of a product will suffer long term, as always, because they probably also make weird decisions based on completely unimportant stuff. Like, what's a "linux", like a big bobcat, right? Can't be any good. They give it away free? Can't be worth much...and so on.
With that said, of course gutsy gibbon is too weird, I prefer "randy rhino", the power tie of names!
I actually wonder why there is still this big iron thinking about root and "unprivileged users", especially around a desktop distro like Ubuntu. I am the only user of my system. If someone breaks into my normal user account and deletes all files there it is the worst possible scenario. If it is done from root, there is not much of a difference. And unprivileged users can also serve as spam bots, they have all the access to a heap of scripting languages and whatnot -- so really, what is the difference?
Just because it happens to be Unix, some people seem to have a sysadmin reflex that tells them root is more worthy than others.
When I switched for a 1600x1200 (Dell) to a 1600x1050 (BenQ), Ubuntu recognized it, but did not reconfigure X for widescreen, and consistently picks some middling 4:3 format that gets stretched. It looks ugly and 2 version upgrades have failed to correct the problem
Editing xconf.org is not a solution for the non-technical user
FTFA
and
I think this is where us techies fall down sometimes. We assume that everyone who uses a computer wants to "Explore their system" or take "control over them".
Let's face it, probably about 90% of computer users use an office type application, a browser and an email client and the more advanced of them may use a feed reader of some sort. The most "control" they want over their system is to change the background and perhaps the colour scheme, and they want to do it easily, no code, no hassle.
And that's fine! Their computer is a tool to do their job. They learn how to do what they need to do and that's it.
So, it's a good thing that Ubuntu is easy to use. Us techies who want to "stray beyond the defaults" will find the way to do it anyway.
America, Home of the Brave.
Re security, I was really surprised when I installed a previous release and SSH wasn't even available. I had to download/install it separately. Granted, you may not want to start the server automatically, but making it easy to set up post install a secure remote connection seems like a good idea.
Also, while gcc was installed, the C++ frontend was not. Ok, so this is maybe an end-user distro, if you're using OpenOffice and mail you don't need C++. But if you want to start with Ubuntu and configure it to do development on, it was extra work compared to other distros.
This guy is obviously writing the review from the angle of a Linux Geek. A newcomer to the world of Linux will just be intimidated by all the shell commands this guy is talking about. I mean, really... is "apt-get update install xasd fdsix ikispkg mnfklsad --v" really that simple to remember? All those incredibly cryptic CLI commands are quite intimidating for the noob, and even intermediate users like myself tend to keep away from them.
Ubuntu is doing wonders for Linux in the popular mindset... users can cut their teeth on it first, then if they want, they can move on to more advanced distros. Don't be recommending that they cut their teeth on Gentoo first, please.
RH brought the linux desktop to the masses. it was roundly criticized for it being too newbie friendly. PEOPLE WONT LEARN LINUX! they all said. Later, the same allegations were leveled at mandrake(iva) and Lindows/spire. IT HURTS LINUX MORE THAN IT HELPS they all cried. Well now that ubuntu is taking the desktop maturity to new levels of easeness, its now completely acceptable, and welcomed by all. Ease of use is in.
The ubuntu cheerleaders, which is allegedly now ~30% of all linux desktop users, defend their darling distro till death. I would wager that many of these same people are the very same people who publicly smacked RH around, mocking those who used it.
My question is, where are those people now?
I grew up on RH, and use Fedora today. I was one of those who, back in the day, would get lol'd at in efnets #linux channels when I asked for help. Perhaps I am the kid who got virtually beat up too many times in my linux childhood, but it seems to me the hypocrisy level is in overdrive in regards to ubuntu.
Welcome to the circle of friends.. ;)
./configure --somespecialconfigureoptions
:)
And hey, if you want to do it, like you did on gentoo, than why not?
There are almost no reasons to do it like you do it there - the speed factor the self-compiling guys (*BSD, Gentoo) are pointing out isn't really there, thats so minimal you can forget about this argumentation.
1.) If you really have to - the package management is flexible enough to let you do this - try it like this:
Load the package you need to configure and compile like this, so the dependencies are resolved like you apt-get some binaries:
apt-get build-dep exampletool
Now do the configure stuff, you find it in debian/rules.
Then use this combined command to get the sources, compile them, and make a package out of them:
apt-get -b source exampletool
2.) Another, less automated way is to download the program you want to compile yourself, and then use a tool like "checkinstall" (its in the repositories).
In this scenario you do the usual things:
make
(and then instead of sudo make install you do:)
sudo checkinstall
Answer the questions and the selfcompiled program is also added to the package managment and also could be removed like you do it otherwise.
As you can see, if someone says "Ubuntu can't do this or this because its focused for beginners" it's just not true.
And not to forgot the rock-solid "Ubuntu-Server" flavour.. We put all our server also from Debian to Ubuntu, because its a lot easier to have actual versions of server-related software with a long-term support (security updates etc.) than to handle on D_____ with a massive amount of backports to achieve the same. And if you have security issues on packages there, you can hope, some people give the same massive amount of time in putting security updates up in a recent time.
Really, if someone can say me something I can't do there, please tell me, perhaps I am missing something
Ubuntu, a terminal, Python and Slashdot. Thats all you need.
Linux, like most Unixes, has a long history of separating things that users can do safely from the things that only privileged users should be able to do. The corners are worn smooth by this point. Windows grew from a single-tasking system with no memory protection (sure, the NT kernel has good, finegrained security, but for backward compatibility they've only finally started insisting on it with Vista) and so applications constantly assume they can muck with things that are none of their business.
On Linux, a regular 'Desktop' user can do all kinds of things, because the apps are written not to need privileges unless they have to have them. The only difference needed between 'Administrator' and 'Desktop' is the ability to sudo.
I wouldn't run Ubuntu on a server... but that's not what it's aimed for.
PHEM - party like it's 1997-2003!
Well, it's only one install to add dev-tools or whatever it's called. And presumably you're going to be downloading the source you want to compile anyway.
Because Windows also makes those choices for the desktop user, and the idea at this stage is to get users away from Windows and on to Linux without them having to think about partitioning disks, one password for them and another for whatever root is, and having to look for a instant messenger app, so they can chat to their sister in Spain. It has to just work as much as possible: to that end the model seems more like OS X, which of course also uses a single user and sudo (and with the rise in popularity of Beryl and Compiz, Ubuntu is starting to look like OS X).
I can see the author's point to an extent, but Ubuntu isn't aimed at him, and he won't be able to approach it from the target user'sperspective.
Just no.
Haven't there been enough "Linux isn't easy enough for mainstream desktop users" articles? Surely you can't expect me to believe it is now suddenly, with the release of Ubuntu GG, going to become too easy for them?
(Not that there is any such thing as too easy, as a previous post said, if you're a power user - open a terminal.)
I, much like you, grew up on RH and was mocked and ignored whenever I had issues. I also use FC7 now. But Ubuntu offers something to newcomers today that we didn't get 10 years ago: a community that doesn't suck.
Perhaps it is dumbing Linux down. My response: so what. People who find Ubuntu to be useful may be likely to try more advanced distros in the future. This is a foot in the door; the gateway drug so-to-speak.
The game.
You have a command line, emacs, vi, the gcc suite, perl, clisp and sbcl. What more could you possibly want?
As long as there's a terminal available and gcc, you just can't complain about lack of power user features in Linux.
He complains about the multiple package management programs. There's no problem here, since they all use the same underlying database, and a newbie would never know about the command line ones, and wouldn't need to.
A new user will get along just fine with the simplicity of Ubuntu on the desktop. A power user will hit the command line and have no problems.
It seems like this guy knows just enough about Debian to be dangerous, and is now cranky that Ubuntu is slightly different.
If moderation could change anything, it would be illegal.
So many people like to proclaim that Ubuntu is for the novice Windows convert. I contest that assertion! I have been managing a fairly large and quite diverse network for a few years now. Our servers range wildly from Debian varieties, to Windows 200x, and Solaris. Personally, I have been using Linux for several years and am not afraid of any "advanced-user" functions. I recently switched to Ubuntu (about a year ago) and won't be going back to my Debian roots anytime soon. Some like to spout that Ubuntu is the *nix O/S that "just works" - I feel differently about that too. Gentoo, Slackware, Red Hat, ... the all "work," it's the operator/administrator that "just doesn't." The question is should the administrator have to? Should time be spent in making the O/S work; or should time be spent configuring the Services and Applications to work?
The answer is simple - Ubuntu gives me a well-secured, base system with excellent hardware support and updates. On more then one occasion I have found the need to break the default Ubuntu base system (removing a default package in favor of another system) and was shocked to see a seamless transition. Try messing around with udev, hal, dbus, and hotplug on any other Linux distro and see what happens. Try swapping out X servers and welcome to Linux hell!
Lastly, Ubuntu has achieved what no other Linux distro ever has and that is their Exceptional support community. The Ubuntu forums (coupled with their online Community contributed docs) is one of the single greatest achievements in the Open community (IMHO) in the last 3 years. The support on the Ubuntu forums is not limited to Ubuntu and I see several non-Ubuntu users linking to Ubuntu forum threads, or asking questions there directly. The support I have received from the forum rivals all other *nix support I have ever dealt with including paid support for Red Hat and Solaris. I even ask questions on the forums non-Ubuntu related. I have asked Perl programming questions and got answers faster then I could through any other Perl or Linux forum. This is the true power of this Distro!
TFA demonstrates its bias in one of its last paragraphs:
Free software has always been about user education and choice, yet, at times, Ubuntu seems to forget these goals in favor of a quick fix that keeps users ignorant and unaware of alternatives.This isn't right. Free software is not "about" anything more than Gift/Liberty: the free beer and the freedom to do as you will. It most definitely is not about educating users who don't want to be educated. That is called "indoctrination" and that is antithetical to liberty.
There are plenty of good Linux distributions for anyone who is interested in picking them apart to gain an education. Ubuntu is not one of them. Ubuntu is for the person who has to use a computer do their work, but may be no more interested in the innards of the software than they are in the oil pump of the bus they take to work.
Remove this education bias from TFA and its criticisms no longer have much substance, if any at all.
Ubuntu does a good job of putting a fully functional Gift/Liberty Open Source Software workstation in front of anyone with minimal computer skills. That it is also constructed so that a person with training could customize it to the specific needs of the guy who has more important things to do than learn about computers is great! (There are such people: some of them are called "neurosurgeons", some are called "rocket scientists", etc.) In this way, Ubuntu takes a big step toward fulfilling the ultimate promise of GLOSS: open computing for the masses necessarily includes computing for people who don't care to learn about GLOSS, FOSS, FLOSS or GNU/whatever.
I completely disagree. I don't think Ubuntu is successful because of Windows users. At all. It is successful because it fills a need that Linux users have been waiting for - a distro that is easy to maintain. Unless you are maintaining multiple machines, you shouldn't be doing many installs. (even if you are, you shouldn't be doing many 'installs') I don't really care if the install takes 15 minutes or 2 hours. I only install once. I have never really understood why so many reviews focus on the installation! Yes, it is important, I have done some really tough installs in my day. It is a critical step, but the MORE important thing is how you maintain the system. That is where Ubuntu really stands out. It is why I switched to it. I was on Mandrake (before it changed names) and before that SuSE and various RedHat distros. This was dependency hell. Even though SuSE and Mandrake said you could update your system, you could not. I ran into ALL kinds of issues, my packages were getting outdated and I couldn't easily update them. So I have now been on Kubuntu for over 2 years, and even did an Upgrade with minimal hassle (damn NVIDIA). Dependency hell is pretty much a thing of the past for me.
Ubuntu lets me USE Linux, and I can tinker where I want to - not where I have to. I still feel like the tinker-factor is still a little high for the average user (esp Windows users) but the strides that Ubuntu has made over other distros is immense.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
Anger issues much?
"It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him." - Tolkien
The main problem with Fedora is that it's very hard to get media and such working. I've used Fedora... it just feels clumsy all the time, whereas Ubuntu doesn't. But that's just my opinion. Fedora is still a good distro, it just doesn't have the flash or the user friendliness in the places where people think it's important. Face it... most people use their computers to IM, watch stupid videos and listen to music. Fedora makes it much harder to set up media codecs and such than Ubuntu does, so people go to Ubuntu. Not to mention that .deb packages just work better than rpm's.
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
I just want to say that in *my* four years of using Gentoo I have never had anyone on the Gentoo forums, irc channels, or any of my colleages (academia or private sector) ever say that Gentoo compiled code is necessarily any faster than delivered binaries. I never had anyone recommend anything but -02 and -pipe for compiler options. What Gentoo does give you is the ability to easily get exactly the system you want. Nothing more, nothing less. Whether any particular piece of binary code is faster on Gentoo is purely on a case by base basis. People use Gentoo for choice, configurability, and on occasion performance.
From the Gentoo home page:
Thanks to a technology called Portage, Gentoo can become an ideal secure server, development workstation, professional desktop, gaming system, embedded solution or something else -- whatever you need it to be.
I've always used Debian for everything, so recently when I had an opportunity to install *nix I decided to give the famously polished Ubuntu a whirl. I downloaded the iso for 7.04 (called "Feisty", IIRC) and checked it out.
Well, I'm pretty luke-warm about it. The first problem was that the live CD picked a screen resolution that was smaller than the window of the installer program, so the controls were off the bottom of the screen, as I figured out fairly quickly. That would have been a fatal flaw for the novice users for which Ubuntu is intended. As for installing from a live CD, it seems like a gimmick. The live CD is a great idea for just trying out the system, but the GUI install program seemed really lame. I don't see why anyone would prefer it to a well-designed ncurses-based installer, like the current Debian installer. I know, it's "graphical", so therefore it is better for novices, or so the reasoning goes.
Also, I think that Gnome is a weird choice for a user base that will be coming from Windows in at least 90% of cases. Sure, it was no big deal to get it set up to my liking, because it's just a Debian system, after all. I just think the default setup is too, well, "dumbed-down". What is the purpose of suppressing all the boot messages in favor of a meaningless screen with a progress bar? Are people frightened by text scrolling by?
Overall, Ubuntu just seems to be a cosmetically redone Debian release with an "easy" spin on it.
How can this reviewer complain about rough edges when Gutsy hasn't even reached Release Candidate status? Those kind of criticisms are fud until they relate to a formal Ubuntu release. Canonical and friends have plenty of time to fix the small stuff before Gutsy's out.
You may want to see these 2 links:
http://ask.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=00/06/27/0248218
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=148177
I don't have my screen inverted, but I have a screen flipped 90 degrees to make better use of a second monitor. The second link was exactly what I needed.
- Basic user - add/remove, updater
- Medium user - synaptic package manager
- Advanced user - apt-get/aptitude/dpkg etc in the terminal
His issues with the security groups are similar - a basic user is not going to mess around with those, whereas a medium user might, and an advanced user would configure it however they want to.For what it's worth, I recently moved to Ubuntu, and its balance between usability and configurability has allowed me to learn a fair bit about using Linux systems without throwing me in at the deep end like other distros do.
If you want gentoo use gentoo , If you want debian use debian, please don't expect every distro to follow your own ideas of the perfect distro and for god's sake, don't even think that your idea of the perfect distro should be considered dogma.
I think that as much as the author blames ubuntu for complacency out of popularity, the things the author is complaining about are not specific to this release which kind of destroys the whole article, as if the guy didn't know the things he is complaining about are exactly the reason ubuntu is so popular.
I RTFA this is a summary:
Color me unimpressed by this article.
Copyright infringement is "piracy" in the same way DRM is "consumer rape"
How many of you recognize right now that MSLinux (Ok Novell) is going to be the only company legally able to distribute moonlight? Why did the firehose skip this story thrice yet they promote these lame "criticism" stories against truly free and MS free Linux distros?
further info
Ubuntu has so many things it can learn from PCLinuxOS, for one the Hardware Detection in PCLOS is the best I have have ever seen in any Linux distro, it is the single only Linux distro that worked on all my machines.
"If I was smarter I could rule the world!"
I tell you what, when you want to contribute, I'll be over here talking with the adults.
"It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him." - Tolkien
it probably IS "quite up to stuff", the question is what do you want from your OS, because if you think, based on this review, that gutsy isn't for you, then your probably looking at the wrong distribution, because your expectations don't seem to match ubuntu's goals.
the real problem is guy's like the one who wrote the article. he write as if his vision of a perfect distribution is the vision of ubuntu, and ubuntu simply failed to achieve it's own goal. the goal being an OS that balances power with ease of use, but sounds more like a power-users tool/geek plaything. that's not true.
ubuntu's slogan is "Linux for Human Beings". they mean it (although it does sound arrogant).they are trying, as far as I can understand, to create a system that is easy and straightforward for the casual home user. I won't judge whether they succeeded or failed (although if I'm a casual home user, then they succeeded), but that's what they are trying to accomplish.
as for concerns in regards to this goal: yes, there are problems. for instance: the file system reform that was being suggested on the forums turned into an ugly verbal fight (relatively speaking. I don't think it would qualify for a flame war). We might one day, perhaps not too far away, see from ubuntu something similar to what GoboLinux did.
the complaint about package management really got to me. basically he's saying they should get rid of GUI's and use apt-get instead (although he doesn't explicitly say that, but he does say "Yet even Synaptic is less flexible than the basic apt-get command, and not much easier to use." and "...After all, apt-get serves the same purpose as all of them."). he also complains that Add/Remove is too limited, when all it's meant to do is give a straightforward interface for adding and removing desktop applications (hmm...that was a tough one. it's not at all they they gave a meaningful name to the application that actually makes it's function perfectly clear). he complains that there is no need for an update manager, when it's purpose is entirely different from synaptic, because he expects the users of ubutu to go out of their way to look for updates and install them.
he asks for a lengthy and complicated installation process, without realizing that ubuntu is meant, among other things, for people who need specific instructions how to post in a forum, simply because it has a slightly different layout than what they are used to using in the 5 different other forums they frequent.
his criticism is valid, but only for a distribution that aims for geeks and power users.
sudo has fairly good logging for who ran what with escalated privs. It is more useful than su for honest users, as you know who to blame & what they did wrong.
I do agree that ubuntu could harness sudo more intelligently. I think ubuntu might be better if they added one additional account level & made it default--one that couldn't execute arbitrary commands as sudo (or use 'sudo -s' to get a shell), but could perform software maintenance & other common tasks with it. (sudo has command whitelists that allow for this kind of thing.) I realize that installation rights are already pretty important privs. But application installation must be almost as convenient as OS X or Windows for a desktop distro that is aimed for adoption by users of those platforms. And disallowing sudoing of other apps is surely better than what we have now.
I haven't give the root password to others who must co-administer boxes with me. 'sudo' is far better.
single-user mode & boot disks pose more of a security concern than using sudo over su
He's complaining that a single user distro has muti user security ishues, people need acces to root and sudo is a great way to do it why keeping the root acount locked out. Your can;t make a OS idiot proof and still useful by super users, windows is the atempt at idiot proof ... they fail, hes just bashing to bash. gutsy looks to be a great distro and will be human usable... o wait that was there goal in the first place.
The writer complains that Ubuntu does things one way, while Debian does things in a better way. He should instead install Debian and write an article about how great Debian is.
Penny - plain text accounting
If there's the option to do more stuff, you have to be very careful to design a UI which will lead ordinary users away from choosing that option. Worse are the "power users", who will try to explore every single option, whether or not they understand it.
It's a deliberate break from the "GNOME or KDE" question you get asked at install time. If you don't know and don't care, you get GNOME. If you know, there's always a way to get more choice -- you could download Kubuntu if you want KDE, for example.
And if you really know what you're doing, you could download the Alternate or Server install CD, install from that (a more powerful installer anyway), and add packages as you need them. Or you can do a normal install, and remove packages, add other ones in later.
In fact, I believe it's possible to "upgrade" a system between Ubuntu and Kubuntu and back.
Now, granted, maybe it would be a good thing to have all of this power as a convenient GUI option. But the choice is there, if you know where to look.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Besides - it's kind of like the only guy in the board meeting wearing a T-shirt and jeans instead of a 3 piece suit. He already knows he's important - he doesn't have to try to look like it. Everyone else may not approve, but they'll just have to accept it.
For fine tuned install you use the alternate install CD which is a standard Debian install.
That's what I used because I wanted to install on a pre-partitioned disk (since the linux partitioner confuses Ghost).
Fine there is a KDE version.
I have used just about every flavor of linux, bsd, OS/2, windows, Mac OS X, and I want the operating system to work for me, and not make me work for it. I think i have anice balance here with OS X, as i can make it do just about anything i want, but i also do not have to worrie about if this driver or that piece of hardware is going to work. I think the idea that just because my computer doesn't make me jump through hoops to make something work the way I want it to does not in any way make it less configurable. Ive used ubuntu and I have installed it for my mom, and it she was able to use it no problem with little or no computer experience, other than a little windows. This is why it is succesfull, and also because I use it for my routers in my house (granted the server edition) but same concept. I do not use it for my desktop because I still don't think it is quite where i need it for my uses, but that is a /personal/ choice. Everyone's needs and wants are different, trying to say one operating system is better than another is just plain silly, beacause what might be good for you, might be compleetly wrong for someone else. And like the pervious states, the whole it has to be hard for it to be elite is equally stupid, come on, it's a computer, the operating system does not limit what you can code, it's all code, and frankly the more restrictive the system, means that perhaps it takes /more/ skills to get it to do exactly what you want. There is nothing elite about being able to edit config files or compling a kernel. Having said that, there is also nothing wrong with it!
Windows Thinking perhaps - but Feisty is already showing Stupidity Tendencies in common with Apple. What a wonderful world we live in. Now if only we could get rid of mediocrity and the retards.
aptitude install build-essential
"When I first heard Daydream Nation it quite frankly scared the living shit out of me." -- Matthew Stearns
You move on to the BSD family.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I've used Fedora... it just feels clumsy all the time, whereas Ubuntu doesn't.
Have to disagree with you there. I was pretty disappointed with how unpolished I found Ubuntu's interface to be, having just installed it on my mum's PC. I'm almost thinking of just recommending she goes back to Windows.
Probably my biggest bugbear is that it still automounts USB memory sticks *synchronously*. This means you can't do the intuative thing - put it in, copy to it, and pull it out - but you must first unmount it, an unnatural and unobvious thing to do. I find myself forgetting occasionally and losing data. It really sucks, makes no sense, and is something that Windows XP gets right. Why does even Ubuntu still have these basic failings?
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
Why is it important to show what packages are installed when there are standard ways to get that information when you boot into the os the first time?
Installations that ask a lot of silly questions waste much more time/work. I can't imagine how much time I've wasted installing versions of Linux where I've walked away to work on something else while it's whirring away only to have it stop because it wants me to baby sit it through a series of choices that I don't really need to make at that stage.
Just install and let me do any configuration from within the OS.
Boffoonery - downloadable Comedy Benefit for Bletchley Park
"Ever try to walk someone through something when you have to tell them where exactly to click on a screen you can't see? "
"Every try to enter a CLI command on somebody else's non-networked computer when you can't reach their keyboard?
This is the fiftieth anniversary of the Ford Edsel. Lame matters - as anyone in marketing - anyone with a nickname they haven't been able to shed since they were nine years old - will tell you.
The Geek is stereotyped as the eternal adolescent - and that carries over to every project burdened with a name like Harried Hare - or Gutsy Gibbon.
Bringing liberty to the masses. - http://freetalklive.com/
And, by *synchronously*, i meant *asynchronously*.
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
Since there are so many complaints about the Ubuntu codenames, I thought I'd praise the release numbering scheme. Does anybody else think it's awesome that you can tell when the distro was released by the version number (7.10 == 2007.October)?
Geeks like to think that they can ignore politics, you can leave politics alone, but politics won't leave you alone.-rms
"This is a foot in the door; the gateway drug so-to-speak."
Absolutely. Once you've addicted the masses to a linux like Ubuntu, if anything bad should happen to Ubuntu (e.g. malware) it would be easy to switch because it's FOSS. The whole free support infrastructure changes. Instead of your geeky nephew knowing to type Meta R cmd, regedit etc... or go into windows settings etc, he'll know to bring u a terminal, apt-get whatever.
If I have seen further it is by stealing the Intellectual Property of giants.
while I found some of his points posing some interesting opinion that I felt inclined to, the one that really stood out as rubbish to me was the package management point.
The add/remove software is a great place for new users to browse.. it's simple to use and doesn't bombard you with libs and low level stuff. It doesn't claim to do everything (a point that he held against it) and lets the user know where to go to do the "harder" stuff. My younger sister was able to add software to her ubuntu system without any help or prompting from me and without knowing the names of project.. she browsed through categories that interested her (multimedia in this case) and then using their description (some of them weren't great, but most were pretty good to excellent), where two packages sounded very similar she looked at the bottom of the description where it says "this works well with (k)ubuntu desktops" and then if she couldn't decide she looked at the number of stars. She calls me the next day and tells me proudly that she has made the computer do what she wants without having to search the world - it was all there from the very beginning. My 16yo sister that has no interest at all in computers beyond getting her school work done and her music projects, became the best advertisement for ubuntu (and linux in general) for her peers.
6 months on and she is eagerly awaiting Gusty and will be upgrading it by herself.
There is nothing bad about having the choice between multiples tools especially if they engage with their audience at the appropriate level.
After all we could all still (and many do) just use vi to do everything in - that is not enough reason to put down the various gui text editors and IDE's etc.
I just can't be bothered.
I was switching between them, but nice to know they'll all actually coexist.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
'Welcome to Ubuntu 7.04, Feisty Fawn!' Large font size. I'm looking at it right now. Firefox is probably the first thing most 'ordinary' users open. If you've changed your home page and don't believe me, have a look: /usr/share/ubuntu-artwork/home/index.html
It's also prominent in System > About Ubuntu and likely other places.
It baffles me how people claim the codenames do not appear in the official releases. They always have, as far as I know.
~ Aero
Deleting your files is definitely not the worst that can happen.
Last year I testified at the trial of a man who was accused of child pornography. Had he been convicted, he would have been marked for life as a sexual deviant and pedophile... everywhere he went, his neighbors would have been informed that he was a dangerous pervert who could not be trusted around children.
Is that a life you'd like to live?
This man's crime was simple: he connected a computer to Comcast cable without installing a firewall. From there, it was nearly inevitable that his life would be destroyed... luckily, we were able to prove that his computer had been compromised by an outside intruder, and that the ham-fisted police "investigation" of the machine had destroyed any evidence that might have been used to prove who was responsible for the offensive files and the hidden FTP server.
It speaks well of you that you couldn't imagine this level of evil without me pointing it out, but I hope that now you understand that losing your files isn't the worst that could happen. You could lose your entire future, my friend.
PS: Defending himself cost this man over $10,000 - and a couple nights in a holding cell where all the other inmates knew him as "the pedophile".
(...) reading TFA. It's a poorly written crock of bull from someone who's not even that well informed over what he's writing. I don't comment much here, and I never *ever* flame, but this guy's obtuseness got me really riled up
I don't know about you, but when I think of the prospect of installing a system for someone who uses a foreign keyboard of some sort (I'm looking into a position as admin at my university's computer labs), the possibility to just type some letters "systematically" as he puts it and have the installer divine the right keymap is supterb. And really, what does he expect from the keymap list? a picture with the layout?
I challenge the author to find a user who could actually put either recover mode or a memory test to good use without outside help that can't figure out quite quickly how to get to the GRUB menu. GRUB being configured to show the boot menu (which, sensibly, is the default behavior if a windows partition is detected) would be about as logical as windows giving you the "safe mode/command prompt/safe mode command prompt" choices at boot every single bloody time. This is called good design. If you don't need to look at it for normal activity, you tuck it away somewhere unobtrusive.
This is nitpicking, but what the hell. The trick with using the corners for "hot spots" (and really, both OSX and Windows already use it -- think start menu and the X button for maximized windows) works best when you don't really rationally think about what you're doing. You just act -- and in those circumstances, the actual size of the icon on-screen is irrelevant. OSX's hot corners have no graphical representation at all, to the eternal chagrin of every Mac newbie I let touch my laptop.
Similarly, assuming you were able to grab the password in a non-sudo system,
% su
input password
# passwd
input new password
# make love
Make: Don't know how to make love. Stop. No need to delete the shadow file in either cases anyway.
The purpose of Ubuntu is for the average user. He wants advanced stuff up front well, he can go for the likes of debian or gentoo. Ubuntu is not intended to focus on advanced. It's intended to focus on the human being.
We must wonder what his real motivation is because it isn't for the good of majority (as the majority are mom and pops).
If we can get a distro that mom and pop will use (as 90% of all people can use Ubuntu effectively) then we should. His attempts to denigrate the attempts of Ubuntu seem somewhat motivated by other things.
We just have to stop giving these people a pedestal and just let the accomplishments of the product speak for itself.
You can lead a man with reason but you can't make him think.
It is possible to have too many fonts. Some applications (and some OSes) catalog all available fonts before they become usable, or at the first attempt to change font. On a slow computer with thousands of fonts, this can take in excess of a minute. For most users just trying to be practical, something in the range of 100 fonts seems reasonable.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
I'm an Ubuntu fanboy and I say this guy is full of crap. He's just gone out to try and make some perfectly good features of Ubuntu look bad. He doesn't even do it well. If he wants to take a cheap shot at Ubuntu then maybe it would be better for him to point out that Ubuntu is crap for instant messaging and the multimedia codecs issue. At least those issues are worth comlaining about unlike the petty issues he brings up in his review. The things he doesn't like aren't necssarily bad things, its more that he personally doesn't like them as a matter of taste. Well he's entitled to say what he wants about Ubuntu, but I just wasted 5 minutes of my time reading that crap.
Once you've installed your system, go into synaptic and start unchecking what you don't want. Yes, this requires you to be able to find out what these packages are, but if you're enough of a security nut to be concerned about the appendix-like programs installed you'll never use, then you're smart enough to figure out how to do that yourself.
Something else the writer seems to ignore is the left-logged-in factor... One reason sudo becomes really smart is that if I'm logged in as my own user, but I don't log out (and don't lock the screen, so for instance my gf can watch some Farscape or something), people can't do undue damage.
Sudo's main advantage is that it makes security easy for the average user. Big lockout before doing any admin tasks and requiring a password. Makes it really simple for the user: Once you're logged in, don't give your password for anything unless you know what you're doing. Sure, using the su (root) password for it may be (slightly) more secure, but Granpa doesn't want to have to remember so many passwords so the only way he can keep track of them all is by putting them on a post-it note next to his screen.
He seems to approach Ubuntu from a sysadmin/*nix-geek standpoint, which is not the target market for Ubuntu at all.
Karma: Non-Heinous
Then there's the Firefox Method that puts all of it where you can change anything you want. Not to mention the dreaded text configuration files that can be manipulated with $EDITOR.
But TFA is concerned about the wrong things. The Ubuntu installation process is designed to get you a functioning system as easily as possible, after which you can choose additional packages, if any, to install. It's one of the few distros that can install a working system from a single CD. I'm willing to trade a whole lot of install-time configurability for not having to swap CDs out. And Ubuntu has had Kickstart compatibility since 5.04, so if I have to admin a whole bunch of machines that need to be configured the same way, I have all the pre-install configuration flexibility I need.
[100% ISO 646 Compliant]
SVM, ERGO MONSTRO.
Thats not that stupid, theres good reasons why that is done, in particular because it greatly extends the life of the usb drive, and also, carelessly pulling the usb drive out can, on some poorly written filesystems, cause the disk to become unusable.