Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: Ubuntu 18.04 LTS Desktop Default Application Survey
Dustin Kirkland, Ubuntu Product and Strategy at Canonical, writes: Howdy all- Back in March, we asked the HackerNews community, "What do you want to see in Ubuntu 17.10?": https://ubu.one/AskHN. A passionate discussion ensued, the results of which are distilled into this post: http://ubu.one/thankHN. In fact, you can check that link, http://bit.ly/thankHN and see our progress so far this cycle. We already have a beta code in 17.10 available for your testing for several of those:
- GNOME replaced Unity
- Bluetooth improvements with a new BlueZ
- Switched to libinput
- 4K/Multimonitor/HiDPI improvements
- Upgraded to Network Manager 1.8
- New Subiquity server installer
- Minimal images (36MB, 18% smaller)
And several others have excellent work in progress, and will be complete by 17.10:
- Autoremove old kernels from /boot
- EXT4 encryption with fscrypt
- Better GPU/CUDA support
In summary -- your feedback matters! There are hundreds of engineers and designers working for *you* to continue making Ubuntu amazing! Along with the switch from Unity to GNOME, we're also reviewing some of the desktop applications we package and ship in Ubuntu. We're looking to crowdsource input on your favorite Linux applications across a broad set of classic desktop functionality. We invite you to contribute by listing the applications you find most useful in Linux in order of preference.
Click through for info on how to contribute. To help us parse your input, please copy and paste the following bullets with your preferred apps in Linux desktop environments. You're welcome to suggest multiple apps, please just order them prioritized (e.g. Web Browser: Firefox, Chrome, Chromium). If some of your functionality has moved entirely to the web, please note that too (e.g. Email Client: Gmail web, Office Suite: Office360 web). If the software isn't free/open source, please note that (e.g. Music Player: Spotify client non-free). If I've missed a category, please add it in the same format. If your favorites aren't packaged for Ubuntu yet, please let us know, as we're creating hundreds of new snap packages for Ubuntu desktop applications, and we're keen to learn what key snaps we're missing.
- GNOME replaced Unity
- Bluetooth improvements with a new BlueZ
- Switched to libinput
- 4K/Multimonitor/HiDPI improvements
- Upgraded to Network Manager 1.8
- New Subiquity server installer
- Minimal images (36MB, 18% smaller)
And several others have excellent work in progress, and will be complete by 17.10:
- Autoremove old kernels from /boot
- EXT4 encryption with fscrypt
- Better GPU/CUDA support
In summary -- your feedback matters! There are hundreds of engineers and designers working for *you* to continue making Ubuntu amazing! Along with the switch from Unity to GNOME, we're also reviewing some of the desktop applications we package and ship in Ubuntu. We're looking to crowdsource input on your favorite Linux applications across a broad set of classic desktop functionality. We invite you to contribute by listing the applications you find most useful in Linux in order of preference.
Click through for info on how to contribute. To help us parse your input, please copy and paste the following bullets with your preferred apps in Linux desktop environments. You're welcome to suggest multiple apps, please just order them prioritized (e.g. Web Browser: Firefox, Chrome, Chromium). If some of your functionality has moved entirely to the web, please note that too (e.g. Email Client: Gmail web, Office Suite: Office360 web). If the software isn't free/open source, please note that (e.g. Music Player: Spotify client non-free). If I've missed a category, please add it in the same format. If your favorites aren't packaged for Ubuntu yet, please let us know, as we're creating hundreds of new snap packages for Ubuntu desktop applications, and we're keen to learn what key snaps we're missing.
- Web Browser: ???
- Email Client: ???
- Terminal: ???
- IDE: ???
- File manager: ???
- Basic Text Editor: ???
- IRC/Messaging Client: ???
- PDF Reader: ???
- Office Suite: ???
- Calendar: ???
- Video Player: ???
- Music Player: ???
- Photo Viewer: ???
- Screen recording: ???
In the interest of opening this survey as widely as possible, we've cross-posted this thread to HackerNews, Reddit, and Slashdot. We very much look forward to another friendly, energetic, collaborative discussion. Thank you! @DustinKirkland On behalf of @Canonical and @Ubuntu
In other news, /. ends tradition of summaries and posts entire encyclopedia to front page.
"But we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it,..." - Nancy Pelosi
Because fallback kernels are for pussies, right?
Web Browser: emacs
Email Client: emacs
Terminal: emacs
IDE: emacs
File manager: emacs
Basic Text Editor: vim
IRC/Messaging Client: emacs
PDF Reader: emacs
Office Suite: emacs
Calendar: emacs
Video Player: emacs
Music Player: emacs
Photo Viewer: emacs
Screen recording: emacs
I'm glad someone is finally asking this question. It's a debate that's long overdue in the *nix community and I can't wait to hear a decisive answer to a question that's bothered me for years.
Why aren't they planning on doing more blockchain integration? Blockchain is the big up and coming technology. If they don't support blockchain technology now then they will fall behind.
When I install Ubuntu I want the kernel to be blockchain-enabled by default. I also want the basic UNIX commands, like "ls", "cat", "df", "ps" and so on to at least be blockchain-compatible, if not blockchain-enabled by default, too. I haven't used GNOME in a long time, so I don't know how well it supports blockchain, but if Ubuntu is switching to GNOME then I hope they have reviewed its blockchain support. Like in the other cases, I want GNOME to be blockchain-enabled by default.
My last request would be to make sure that cron also supports blockchain, so that I can use it to schedule blockchain maintenance periodically. I know some people like the use automatic mark-and-sweep garbage collection with their blockchain, but I prefer a more manual approach combined with minimal cron-scheduled automatic blockchain maintenance scripts.
This release of Ubuntu clearly features some big changes, so I hope they go all the way and make sure that their blockchain support and integration is the best that it can be. Think of blockchain as like UTF-8 was a decade ago: it's the big upcoming technology. If you support it early, like Linux did, then things will be golden in the future.