Slashdot Mirror
Ubuntu "Karmic Koala" RC Hits the Streets With Windows 7
oranghutan writes "Computerworld is reporting Canonical has made available the Release Candidate of its latest Linux-based operating system, Ubuntu 9.10, on the same day Microsoft launched the long-awaited Windows 7. 'The upcoming Canonical release, which is code-named Karmic Koala, is the latest version of the popular flavor of the Linux OS. The development release on Thursday pushed the OS one step closer to final release, which is due on Oct. 29, according to the company's release schedule Web page. An image of the OS is available for download on Ubuntu's Web site. Test versions of Karmic Koala RC available for download include the server, desktop and netbook versions.'"
I live for high upload:download ratios
I'm looking forward to the official 9.10 release, but I really want some new hardware to run it on! Almost all the netbook offerings are going the XP/W7 route. Providers like system76 have some OK offerings, but they are on the pricey side. I wish I had a wide selection of hardware without having to pay the Microsoft tax!
News would entail what's new in this version.
Non news is a "hey guys Ubuntu has something new too" cry for attention amidst the Win 7 release.
Ubuntu is great and all, but this article is crap.
It barely gets around to mentioning:
"Built on the latest Linux 2.6.31.1 kernel, Ubuntu 9.10 offers faster boot times, an improved user interface and programming tools for easier software development, according to Canonical."
This should please all three linux desktop users.
Why, oh why is this annexed with Windows 7. The release of either affects the other in no way what-so-ever. If Ubuntu beta/rc is not news worthy by itself, releasing on the same day with Win7 doesn't change that in any way. And yes, even one sentence about what's new in this would not hurt...
no one cares
No - the RC is usually nearly identical to the actual release. Only if there is something totally disastrous (eats your data, leaves dirty socks in the hall, sleeps with your girlfriend/boyfriend/cat/dog) would the final release be delayed.
Anything I post is strictly my own thoughts and doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the opinions of IBM.
I upgraded a week or so back, seems solid so far. PulseAudio seems to be properly configured now, haven't had weird audio routing issues yet at least...
Boot is supposed to be faster, haven't clocked it so I'm not sure it actually is. But then again my desktop has been through several dist upgrades already.
But if you have an ICE1712 / Envy24 (M-Audio Delta) based pro sound card stay away, it's currently broken. Fortunately I boot to windows for my music making needs... ;)
.: Max Romantschuk
"Karmic Koala" is great, but I would like to believe that "All-knowing Frog" was a close second.
The 2009-10-29 release date was chosen over 8 months ago, several months before Microsoft announced their release date for Windows 7.
Pills... find your pills...
Interesting.
No, I don't think it would have made a difference when they released it. Canonical sticks to a strict release cycle every April and October and they won't alter their release date just to try and compete with other operating systems. They're appealing to a fairly different user base, anyway.
People who are weighing the option of Windows 7 vs Ubuntu 9.10 as their primary OS are going to make their choice regardless of which one came out a week earlier.
/* No Comment */
it worked for God. Miracles CAN happen, when you apply yourself.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
This bug was reported on Oct 15th, and fixed on Oct 22nd. What more do you want?
Of course if you're a Microsoft slave, you can wait for a bug to be fixed "when we get around to it", which will probably be in SP1 in 4-6 months or so - depending on how buggy THIS Windows version is... (sometimes they have to release the SP faster, like with Vista).
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
I'm looking forward to officially-supported VDPAU. Even with a moderately beefy Athlon X2, playback's a little jerky for 720p AVCHD movies from my camcorder. With some hacking and PPAs, I can get VDPAU working with 9.04, and it's much better - CPU usage massively reduced, yet smooth playback.
PHEM - party like it's 1997-2003!
What I want to know is, what the heck does a RC build mean to these guys? The (only) RC is dropped one week ahead of the final release? That's not really enough time to even get feedback from the test userbase, much less actually do anything about the bugs that might show up. So, are we to assume that the RC is basically just a marketing stunt?
Ubuntu's fall release date has been set in stone for years, the RC release date has been up since before Windows 7's release date was announced.
Microsoft is the company that chose to release Windows 7 on the same day as Ubuntu's release candidate, not the other way around. Seems like Microsoft wanted to overshadow and minimize the latest release of Ubuntu, and do so without actually permitting Ubuntu to compete.
It's so very tempting to mod this Informative...
A huge Koala has trashed my hall with a load of dirty socks, and is now fucking my girlfriend!
Well the Koala is getting sloppy seconds, but I think your girlfriend was starting to enjoy the Jackalope.
Oh wait, what are we talking about? This is slashdot. You don't HAVE a girlfriend...
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Window's 8 will fix all those issues, once Mac and Linux develop the solutions.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I've got hardy on my thinkpad at the moment. I'm considering upgrading just because the new gtk in karmic enables a transparent system tray so AWN will finally look right.
I never liked having two horizontal bars or panels on my screen, especially on a 14" widescreen. too much wasted real estate. especially when applications have a title bar. then add fire fox book mark bar, menus and address bar and that doesn't leave a lot of real estate!
AWN with google chrome makes the most of it.
Linus gives his verdict
For all intensive porpoises your a bunch of rediculous loosers
Isn't the point of a release candidate to give people enough time time to make sure a product is stable and ready for prime time release, and to fix issues should they arise? Wouldn't an OS, with a whole slew of apps, require a bit mroe than a week for this? I mean, a release of Firefox is usually in RC for several weeks, if not months, before it goes from RC to official release.
"It's like a koala crapped a rainbow in my brain"
I'm all for Linux but who comes up with these names ??
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
No - the RC is usually nearly identical to the actual release. Only if there is something totally disastrous (eats your data, leaves dirty socks in the hall, sleeps with your girlfriend/boyfriend/cat/dog) would the final release be delayed.
You joke, but almost every Ubuntu release I can think of has shipped with major problems that never get fixed. Once it "shipped", despite few reasons to do so (this isn't a commercial software release), major bugs sit ignored. For example, one release had numerous bugs like dimming the screen due to inactivity, and never un-dimming it. It was never fixed. In general, the Ubuntu release model is astoundingly ignorant, assuming that because they release every 6 months, there's no need to fix functionality problems in releases. This is especially problematic given the lack of QA and focus on Shiny(TM). The latest release is all focused on "Cloud Computing" buzzword compliance, not stability or reliability.
Don't get me started about the issues with the Intel GMA drivers. "8.04LTS" worked fine on a number of systems, and 9.x caused never-ending forum postings from users wondering why the hell they couldn't get X going. The KVM stuff has also been incredibly half-baked. I'm pretty sure there's still no way to use virtual-builder to deploy a VM on an logical volume. It'll build the machine, but fuck up the kernel/bootloader install, and the end result is a machine that won't boot. I've got a machine sitting here that crashes Xorg after a few minutes; the mouse goes dead, and we've tried 6 different mice.
Lastly, Canonical has been getting uncomfortably cozy with tying in pay-for services into the OS, either theirs or 3rd parties. I was shocked when I logged into a 9.x machine and got a welcome message that pushed their statistical monitoring "service". Now I see all sorts of Cloud Computing crap. It's becoming increasingly clear that Canonical isn't in this for the good of the world, but lining their pockets via what is essentially bundling agreements. You know how we need wipe Dell and HP systems of all the shit they "bundle"? Well, look who's coming to dinner: third-rate "partners"...
Please help metamoderate.
I would imagine lots of folks with jobs do. I get it, Centos is not big with the unemployed living in Mom's basement demographic, but trust me outside that locked door there is a whole world with many people that do care about it.
Don't get me started about the issues with the Intel GMA drivers. "8.04LTS" worked fine on a number of systems, and 9.x caused never-ending forum postings from users wondering why the hell they couldn't get X going.
Yep, that is well known, and yes it is mostly fixed in 9.10.
I never liked having two horizontal bars or panels on my screen, especially on a 14" widescreen.
Here's how I solved that in Ubuntu Jaunty on my 9" laptop:
Lonely Loser will be the next release name.
AFAICT, Canonical has always released on time (perhaps one exception, late by only a week or two out of 6 months). The RC gives them a chance to delay without being a total surprise, though the don't (hardly) ever exercise the option. And their actual releases don't seem any buggier than any other distro's, in fact a lot less buggy, and never a showstopper, and quickly (and regularly) followed by automated bugfix updates.
So what that says to me is their release process is very rigorous. And that they use the RC protocol anyway. All of which sounds good to me.
--
make install -not war
I've been using the Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala beta for some time and its pretty solid. I upgraded my Windows Vista Ultimate with Windows 7 Ultimate. Windows told me of about a dozen programs that would no longer work. iTunes would have to be reinstalled/upgraded, etc. And I've yet to get Bluetooth Advanced Audio working ... which seems to be broken for quite a few folks. Win 7 doesn't appear to give
any greater performance than Vista did (my observations only).
Ubuntu v9.10 Karmic costs me $0
Windows 7 cost me $219.
I've now using Ubuntu as the Host OS and I'm running Windows 7 as a Guest OS virtualized in KVM... works great and no dual boot any more. If Windows crashes and burns I can just start a new VM.
The (only) RC is dropped one week ahead of the final release? That's not really enough time to even get feedback from the test userbase, much less actually do anything about the bugs that might show up. So, are we to assume that the RC is basically just a marketing stunt?
Considering that is not the purpose of a release candidate, of course not.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_release_life_cycle
The term release candidate (RC) refers to a version with potential to be a final product, ready to release unless fatal bugs emerge. In this stage of product stabilization (read QA cycle), all product features have been designed, coded and tested through one or more Beta cycles with no known showstopper-class bug.
RC just means no new code will be added at that point, so no new testing is needed, as all the code/features in it by that point were tested in development/alpha/beta stages.
There of course could be bugs in the RC, but that is true of the final release just the same.
These days an RC is used more to get users outside of your normal beta testers to use it, and make sure it works with the basics and didn't majorly break anything else that used to work in previous versions.
Assuming that happens, the RC is basically renamed to release.
Commercial software calls it RTM (release to manufacturer) which burns and presses the final CD/DVDs, and for open source that is the day the ISO is copied to the main download mirrors.
[...] If not, you could try to contact MS support and talk about the problem, whether that is free or not depends.
I'm guessing that you've never tried to navigate their spaghetti-like phone-tree with its loops, spirals, double-backs and yes dead ends where they will hang up on you for following the wrong rabbit trail with no way to go back. That is the most frustrating, useless, upsetting, making me feel like hurting somebody a lot, afternoon that I ever spent. Oh, and the pound key that all phone systems use to go back one level? That works under some menus.
Nooo! We're talking about repackaged Debian. Stay on topic!
* Braces self for negative modpoints *
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Thats because of the new Intel UXA driver... It also improved performance in my Acer Aspire One
No sig for the moment.
Linux does not have a UI, the distribution chooses a desktop environment and window manager, etc to their specifications. Look at KDE 4.2 and later and not a Gnome based distribution if you want to see a nice UI.
Karmic Koala is fine, but I just can't wait for Masterbating Monkey to be released!
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
The U2400 is either a low power Core 2 Duo CPU from Intel or a Nano CPU from VIA. The Mini 5100 uses an Atom N280, which is a different processor entirely. While all three are supported quite well by Linux, none of them do much for wireless networking.
What you probably have is an HP un2400 (USB ID 03f0:201d), which uses the Qualcomm GOBI chipset. You'll need the qcserial module to run it, and that is included in the 2.6.31 kernel which ships with Ubuntu 9.10. I can't speak for how easy it will be to use, but support is in the kernel and will be installed by default if you upgrade to The Koala.
No, I not joking, I seriously use it.
I know a lot of folks who use it, too :). CentOS is great for organizations that use RHEL but don't need paid support on every server instance. I'm a Debian/Ubuntu guy myself, but to each their own.
/me goes back to testing the Ubuntu 9.10 RC now...
512 MB RAM, 20 GB disk, 200 GB transfer, five datacenters. $19.95/month.
Ah, the OSS Mantra ... "it is mostly fixed".
No, it means that it is an actual RC ("release candidate"). Now, true, some notable large software companies use "release candidate" as just a later beta, but that's not what it should mean.
"8.04LTS" worked fine on a number of systems, and 9.x caused never-ending forum postings from users wondering why the hell they couldn't get X going.
You know what LTS means, right? Long Term Support. As in, if it doesn't work in the newest version, but does in the older you're fine. Cause the older version is good for another couple of years of updates. the Ubuntu team has been very upfront about LTS releases being for "stability" and other releases being for new features. So yeah, if there is a "feature" that does not work right, and prevents you from upgrading, wait for the next LTS release, which will be very much inside the support window.
The MS mentality of everyone must always run the newest version of everything or else you won't be protected or get new features is pure crap. That doesn't have to happen in open source, when they aren't trying to force you to constantly upgrade to help their revenue cycle.
What are we going to do tonight Brain?
If your going to do that why not just run a real OS?
As someone with a real job who uses Linux there (not as much as we used to unfortunately), I switched most of my servers to Ubuntu from CentOS a while back.
I'll admit that lots of people are still using CentOS (and I'll never mock a distro's users - though I'm on Linux Mint now, I used to use Gentoo at home, and before that I was on Slackware - 'nuff said), but even in the corporate world it seems like the push is towards Ubuntu.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
I get the advantages of ubuntu on the desktop but on there server why would you want to switch from CentOS to Ubuntu?
IranAir Flight 655 never forget!
Okay I've been wanting to vent about this for a few weeks now and this seems to be as good a topic to write this in as any.
My first encounter with Ubuntu came when I recently installed Ubuntu Jaunty on a laptop for a club I belong to. The laptop's got an XP licence but we couldn't find a CD and the programs we need are available for Linux, so Ubuntu seemed like a good choice to get us up quickly. And it worked out fine: Install was simple and quick and the system looked good. The only tricky bit was figuring out the wireless setup but it wasn't too hard.
However I was utterly horrified to see that Ubuntu has also faithfully and I must say blindly replicated the most hideous features of Windows! The despicable "My Documents" folder structure was the first and most obvious. Say what you well about Vista, at least it fixed this into something less cumbersome and more sensible. Next was the constant prompting I got after doing almost every little thing. If I wanted that I'd have left UAC enabled on my Vista desktop. Then I find out Firefox was happily setup to save everything to the desktop by default. FOLDERS EXIST FOR A REASON!!!
Why why WHY are so many Linux folks trying to clone Windows when they dislike it so? It may be Linux and it may be free, but if it looks and acts like Windows then it's still an ugly mess. Here I thought Ubuntu would take the best features of Window and combine them with Linux, but instead all they did was turn Linux into a horrible disgusting Windows clone.
If a company knocks off another company's product we accuse them of stealing ideas. If someone releases some new program (open source or not) that replicates existing functionality we say "well why use yours when I can just use the original?" So why should we get all happy excited about Ubuntu when all it does is rip off Windows? To me that'd be the height of hypocrisy.
Mod me down, I don't care. I had to get this off my chest...
Wait, *runs linux* or *runs on linux*?
If your girlfriend *runs on linux*, have you considered distributing the code and schematics under an open license? It would really be a boon to the rest of the slashdot community.
*By the way -- don't try to release your flesh-and-blood girlfriend under an open license without getting her permission first. Sometimes the downstream modifications are nice, but most of the time they just result in either new dependencies or a borked kernel.
"Trolls they were, but filled with the evil will of their master: a fell race..." -- J.R.R. Tolkien on Olog-hai
Why not? The community support is better, there's a server version with the GUI stripped out that works well, and for what we're using it for (one MySQL database server, a webserver, a Zabbix performance monitoring server for other systems, and an email gateway) Ubuntu works just as well. Our desktops and most of our servers are Windows (not by my choice, but I have to live with that) so about all we're using Linux for is a few disjointed systems.
At the time I was migrating all my systems to virtual machines anyways to make management easier (and I've always had hiccups with live-migrating machines - regardless of os - from physical to virtual), so I decided when I rebuilt them to go with Ubuntu instead.
We are running OpenBSD on some of the other systems (DNS and a lot of our routers) but the main network admin handles those systems (I've used FreeBSD some but have never even tried OpenBSD).
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
How come 90% of the comments are bitching and bickering when it comes to things like this. Everyone tries to find the "best" OS - not gonna happen. I use Ubuntu, I'm a web developer, it's very stable, easy to maintain, and supports all the software I need. My design counterparts use Macs (go figure). Our IT guy uses Gentoo because he has all the tools he needs, and the know-how to run the fucker. The office administrative staff uses Windows XP because it's stable and supports what they do. And my boss uses Windows 98 because he's stubborn and old. You know what? They all suck in some manner - I can't run my apps on the designer's systems, and visa versa, the admin staff would have an anurism trying to use *nix, and the IT guy wouldn't be nearly as productive on Windows. That being said they're also very useful in their respective places. Stop bitching, use whatever you like and helps you in your work (if you have a job and don't live in your mom's basement), and maybe try to find the positive in something? Like diversity, competition? Maybe? Yeah?
There's a way to get a Thinkpad without Vista on it from the Lenovo site, haven't tried it recently but it worked a month ago. Change the CPU in any system to a Celeron, then select the enabled Vista Starter option (you know, for developing countries that would be confused by having a first world operating system). Then change the CPU to something real, and the OS changes to no charge DOS. You can then place the order. I ordered a T400S using this technique. Good luck!
Statistical monitoring "service"... what are you talking about? You are asked whether or not you want to participate in Popularity Contest, which is just data collection about what apps you use the most.
The "one release" with the screen dimming bug was 8.10... short memory?
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law
I ran KDE for about 15 minutes before being so annoyed with not being able to do things the way I was used to in gnome that I switched back to gnome.
There. Fixed it for you.
Mada mada dane.
Well, sure ... MS keeps an eye on Linux to see how far popular distros have come. In fact, they *even* have some developers working for them who like and use Linux.
But we've heard for well over a decade now that "any time now", Linux is going to have its day and "threaten Windows for dominance" .... and it never really happens.
I think it's rather idealistic to believe Linux can somehow overtake a gigantic commercial endeavor to make and market an operating system, when in reality, a BIG part of such a battle would involve convincing a massive number of existing Windows users to abandon the platform they're already used to using. Considering the advertising and P.R. budgets for a Linux distro vs. somebody like Apple or Microsoft? You can see a little problem there.
If Linux was just as ready and user-friendly for the desktop PC as what Apple or Microsoft had to offer, about 18 years ago, THEN we'd have more of a "fair fight". But in reality, Linux is a "Johnny come lately" to the game, having spent much of its existence concentrating on being true to its Unix roots with shell scripts, a command line, and catering more to server administration and educational/research/mathematical apps than to entertainment, "home productivity apps" and the like.
fwiw, ive used linux on the desktop for about 3 years but have used windows 7 regularly since the RC build was released to the public several months agoo (because i built a new rig, wanted to game...but not pay for the OS)
its actually quite stable, being basically a big upgrade on vista. in the RC the sleep settings didnt work very well, but that has been resolved in the Pro release. i was surprised to wake my computer up one morning, find that it had downloaded updates in the middle of the night and put itself back to sleep while saving the wordpad doc i had left open with some notes in it.
By and large, language is a tool for concealing the truth. -- George Carlin
You lost us at the wording "Why not?"
No professional ever changes for the sake of changing.
The community support is far from better, it's UBUNTU. Redhat/CentOS has a world of following. Besides, how many Oracle or install on Ubuntu by support-release?
Ubuntu hasn't proven itself as anything better than another way to do what Red Hat/CentOS has done in the server world.
Our entire data center is Red Hat/CentOS, with XEN virtualization and clustering. While I'm a Debian/Gentoo person, I've noticed the merits of using something industry-accepted when in a publically traded company.
-- This space for lease, low setup fee, inquire within!
I think you're totally wrong. The basics of the WIMP - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WIMP_(computing) - experience date way before Windows, and Microsoft only got file structure sensible - not storing data with programs - post Windows 95. Firefox across all operating systems can be configured to ask where to save documents so it's not an Ubuntu thing. And what's especially wrong with My Documents? The main thing Ubuntu tries to do is make it easy for people to understand how to use the OS. On that level, they succeed admirably. The same strategy is used for OpenOffice - make it like Office so people can adjust to it easily. That's the main goal - make it functional and easy to use, free and easy to install for as many people as possible. Those who need to can "escape" to the more advanced options. Being different for the sake of being different would be a terrible mistake.
I work in government rather than a publicly traded company, but as I said I was redoing the installs anyways as a result of moving to a virtual environment, so it's not like I was changing for the sake of changing.
Also, if you'll notice in my post, I never mention Oracle or any other application that doesn't work well on Ubuntu. The simple fact of the matter is that for what I'm using it for, Ubuntu works fine. Bandying about doom and gloom predictions isn't hampering my little Ubuntu VM's which have been humming along without a hiccup for the better part of a year now.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
Try NFS or CIFS, or even SFTP. KIO supports FISH, too.
But we've heard for well over a decade now that "any time now", Linux is going to have its day and "threaten Windows for dominance" .... and it never really happens.
It has happened on servers. People replace windows servers with linux servers all the time and find they are faster, more stable, and easier to manage. A lot of places will blindly stick to windows because that's what they know but that has always happened. A lot of old companies blindly stick to os/390, VMS, and other legacy stuff too.
Stop living vicariously through other modders.
No sig for you!!
It's pretty simple. Ubuntu is based on Debian and Debian has the best package manager around.
Not only does Debian have the best package manager around but they also strive to have very
comprehensive binary package repositories. So even someone with obscure interests may find
that what they want is "already there".
Take the "bleeding edge" quality off of Ubuntu and you've basically got Debian.
Call it "the turtle's son"...
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
i was surprised to wake my computer up one morning, find that it had downloaded updates in the middle of the night and put itself back to sleep while saving the wordpad doc i had left open with some notes in it.
See... that's just creepy to me.
RUGBYRUGBYRUGBY
I must be getting old. The parent has been modded as informative, but to me it just looks like the poster had a stroke as they were typing in the message.
I hope the recovery goes well, either way!