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Ubuntu Linux-based Distro Lubuntu To No Longer Focus on Old Hardware (betanews.com)

Posted by msmash on from the change-of-plans dept.

Lubuntu, a popular Ubuntu flavor, has gained traction over the years for supporting older hardware. As Brian Fagioli writes at BetaNews, one of the focuses of the Lubuntu developers is to support aging computers. However, that is about to change. He adds: When Lubunu 18.10 is released in October 2018, it will ditch LXDE for the newer LXQt. Despite it also being a desktop environment that is easy on resources, the Lubuntu developers are planning to drop their focus on old hardware after the transition. "[...] Our main focus is shifting from providing a distribution for old hardware to a functional yet modular distribution focused on getting out of the way and letting users use their computer. In essence, this is leveraging something we have always done with Lubuntu; providing an operating system which users can use to revive their old computers, but bringing this to the age of modern computing," says Simon Quigley of Lubuntu team.

50 of 85 comments (clear)

  1. Errr by thegarbz · · Score: 1

    providing an operating system which users can use to revive their old computers, but bringing this to the age of modern computing

    Pick one. You can't have both.

    1. Re:Errr by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      Can't you? I remember creating a Kali respin (non-PAE) for my old T40 and it worked fine.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    2. Re:Errr by MindStalker · · Score: 1

      I think being a Lite distribution their goal is to be able to run on modern light systems like small tablets. The old Lubuntu code will still be out there if you want to run this on your ancient computer, but this is a solved problem as far at Lubuntu goes, if they want to further develop it they need to shift their goals.

    3. Re:Errr by Tough+Love · · Score: 1

      what they're saying is: lxqt is a fucking hog, even worse than gtk based lxde, and it won't run on lower-end hardware anymore.

      You wish. But my experience with QT contradicts your claim, it is quite light on its feet. Better than GTK by every measure including performance, especially being actual OO instead of a hot mess of C abuse.

      --
      When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
    4. Re:Errr by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      So you picked the former.

    5. Re:Errr by Wycliffe · · Score: 1

      providing an operating system which users can use to revive their old computers, but bringing this to the age of modern computing

      Pick one. You can't have both.

      Sure you can. You can support oldish hardware without supporting really really old stuff. A raspberry pi is faster and has more memory than a 486. It makes no sense for anyone to support really really old desktop hardware. The cost of the electricity alone to run a 486 desktop for a year could buy a faster more energy efficient computer. There is some cutoff where continuing to support really old systems causes more problems than it fixes.

    6. Re:Errr by luther349 · · Score: 2

      the title of this post is bs. i tested lxqt on manjaro its just as snappy as lxde. its just as fast as lxde. what going to happen is the removal of of 32bit.

    7. Re:Errr by luther349 · · Score: 2

      the entire post is just some editor talking shit. lxqt is just as light as lxde.

    8. Re:Errr by Tough+Love · · Score: 1

      And it had to do no less than thoroughly rape C++ with a preprocessor only to accomplish what Smalltalk accomplished naturally.

      Hold your horses there. I don't much like the MOC either, but it's a small blemish compared to the massive rape GTK perpetrates with C. And the deep rooted crappiness of GTK shows through to the end user. Compare a QT file dialog to GTK for example, just a tiny tip of the iceberg.

      Meanwhile creating bindings to Gtk+, whatever its deficiencies in manual C programming are (admittedly that really sucks), is way easier, not least because of C++'s ABI's piss-poor interoperability compared to C's ABI, hence the much higher avalability of higher language bindings for Gtk+.

      You're making that up, you obviously haven't done it yourself. I have, so I know you're full of crap. Anybody who has coded in both GTK and QT knows exactly why Lubuntu is switching to QT.

      --
      When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
    9. Re:Errr by Aighearach · · Score: 1

      Why are you claiming not to know that OOP is a perspective, not a language feature? It makes you embarrassingly ignorant.

    10. Re:Errr by Tough+Love · · Score: 1

      apparently thirty three language communities decided to bind to Gtk+, sometimes in multiple implementations, but only fourteen language communities decided to bind to Qt5 (of course some bindings are missing from the list, but that happened to both sides) - which is rather telling, isn't it?

      It does tell you something: the vast majority of GUI apps are written in OO languages now. But even without a binding you can easily put a QT GUI on a C program if you want to. You compile main() as C++, add your GUI there, then the rest of your C code is compiled and called as standard C. Alternatively, you can make the small changes required to compile your C code as C++. Far easier than gritting your teeth and dealing with endless GTK crappiness, and a slicker end result.

      I doubt anybody will lose sleep over not being able to call QT from Tcl or Fortran. If somebody really does want Fortran+QT then they can do it the same way as C.

      --
      When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
    11. Re:Errr by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

      But even without a binding you can easily put a QT GUI on a C program if you want to. You compile main() as C++, add your GUI there, then the rest of your C code is compiled and called as standard C. Alternatively, you can make the small changes required to compile your C code as C++

      Except I'm actually mostly interested in putting a Qt GUI on a Common Lisp or Chez program. For C APIs, this is almost trivial because of the fantastic FFIs for these platforms, but C++'s ABI makes it virtually impossible with C++ interfaces because only C++ compilers understand C++'s ABI, not to mention incompatibilities of classes, templates, exceptions etc. Hence KDE's invention of Smoke (which I gave up on around 2010, as I already said).

      Anyway, these days I'm mostly eyeing IUP which not only has a rather nice C interface but unlike both Qt and Gtk+ is fully native on Windows, which makes it much, much nicer than either for Windows users.

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    12. Re:Errr by Tough+Love · · Score: 1

      I'm actually mostly interested in putting a Qt GUI on a Common Lisp or Chez program.

      You're in luck

      --
      When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
    13. Re:Errr by K.+S.+Kyosuke · · Score: 1

      I know about CommonQt. It is very recent, though, with limited version support, quite rudimentary, and not terribly polished at the moment. And the binaries are rather huge. It is developing quite rapidly though, so I might give it a try.

      --
      Ezekiel 23:20
    14. Re:Errr by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      And running a modern desktop on a Raspberry Pi is like a "quick" trip to the DMV. There's no such thing. Modern Linux variants are painfully slow on the Raspberry Pi unless you cut out all modernity and restrict your options to software specifically catering for low hardware performance.

    15. Re:Errr by G00F · · Score: 1

      This is a real problem when looking at server class systems with very basic graphics cards (often with no and/ or very buggy 3d acceleration)

      What the hell are you doing installing a GUI on a server? What it really matters is older desktops, that have no, or very limited video acceleration/3d.

      --
      The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive
  2. Focus shift by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Our main focus is shifting from providing a distribution nobody uses to one that somebody uses. Also we would like it if people on IRC stopped laughing at us

    -Simon Quigley of Lubuntu

  3. Sending users back to Windows XP. by xack · · Score: 2

    Windows XP despite not being officially supported is still used widely in China and in enterprise with specialist software and hardware. Without giving people a Linux route for old hardware you send people back to proprietary software. I hope your happy "freedom advocates". Remember XP requires just a Pentium and 64MB RAM.

    1. Re:Sending users back to Windows XP. by slack_justyb · · Score: 4, Informative

      hope your happy "freedom advocates". Remember XP requires just a Pentium and 64MB RAM.

      Slackware only needs a 486 and 64MB. With 128MB and WindowMaker, the system purrs for the most part. Of course, that's not my daily driver.

    2. Re:Sending users back to Windows XP. by JackieBrown · · Score: 1

      Or they can use a different distro...

      And they can still use the last version even though its support is now limited. But it's still a lot newer and more secure and better supported than Windows XP.

      I have a pretty powerful computer running Debian Sid. Linux isn't solely used for old XP computers

    3. Re:Sending users back to Windows XP. by omnichad · · Score: 2

      If you can still use outdated, insecure Windows you can still use outdated, insecure Lubuntu. I see no difference here. Neither will run recent versions of Chrome/Chromium or Firefox. Neither get security updates.

    4. Re:Sending users back to Windows XP. by luther349 · · Score: 1

      then slack isnt going to have any packages soon as every distro and dev is doing away with 32bit.

    5. Re:Sending users back to Windows XP. by Wolfrider · · Score: 1

      > Remember XP requires just a Pentium and 64MB RAM

      --Give me a break, you can buy a halfway decent PC on Amazon Prime for under $100 these days and ship it nearly anywhere. Practically nobody is restricted to XP low-end specs anymore, and if you stuffed XP into 64MB RAM it would run like ass - even with an SSD.

      https://www.amazon.com/Lenovo-...

      --The Core 2 Duo even has HW virtualization in the CPU, FFS. With a 64-bit processor and 4GB RAM, you can do a low-resource Linux host with ZFS, and a small Virtualbox XP VM.

      --
      .
      == WolfriderV6 == I'm willing to admit that *I just might* be wrong... Are you??
    6. Re:Sending users back to Windows XP. by squiggleslash · · Score: 1

      People who don't want to run an unsupported older version of XP are welcome to instead run an unsupported older version of Lubuntu (or whatever), so what is your point here?

      --
      You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
    7. Re: Sending users back to Windows XP. by slack_justyb · · Score: 1

      then slack isnt going to have any packages soon as every distro and dev is doing away with 32bit

      Clearly you haven't used Slackware.

    8. Re: Sending users back to Windows XP. by luther349 · · Score: 1

      i have. im just pointing out 32 bit is being phased out so installing it on your 486.

    9. Re:Sending users back to Windows XP. by antdude · · Score: 1

      But that is very slow. :(

      --
      Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
    10. Re:Sending users back to Windows XP. by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      Remember XP requires just a Pentium and 64MB RAM.

      It also will implode if you dare attach it to a network, instantly owned by malware. At the very least XP needs to be isolated until you install SP3. When you install SP3 you've got bugger chance of running it on 64MB of RAM.

    11. Re:Sending users back to Windows XP. by aquabat · · Score: 1

      Last time I used Slackware, it needed significantly less than that, but that was back in 1999. My first Linux box was a Cyrix 486slc running Slackware 3.4, IIRC. I had 1 MB of RAM, a 512MB hard drive, and a trident 9000 video card in that box. It took me all night in the Physics reading room, at uni, to ftp it from ftp.cdrom.com onto 57 floppy disks, using the department's IBM 5150. Good distro.

      --
      A republic cannot succeed till it contains a certain body of men imbued with the principles of justice and honour.
    12. Re:Sending users back to Windows XP. by aquabat · · Score: 1

      This was in '96. I used Slack until '99, then tried out Mandrake for a couple of years, and then eventually moved to Gentoo in about '01. Also, my Uni never threw anything out. They were using (possibly still are using) another 5150 or maybe a 5160 in the actual physics lab to control experiments and collect data. The PC hardware was simple and well documented, which made it easier to understand how it might affect your experiment.

      --
      A republic cannot succeed till it contains a certain body of men imbued with the principles of justice and honour.
  4. low resources hw vs old hardware by 4wdloop · · Score: 2

    Supporting old hardware has little to do with low-resource focused distribution (albeit it helps to be low resource on old hardware).

    Would it simply be just another desktop install option in Ubuntu then?

    For low-resource x86 hw there are other options, I personally like TinyCore. How about for arm hw (RPI etc.)?

    --
    4wdloop
  5. Does it still run in old software? by OneHundredAndTen · · Score: 1

    For, if it does not any longer, it loses the essence of its motivation to exist in the first place - when it comes to being a resource hog, Gnome and KDE already excel in the Linux world.

    1. Re:Does it still run in old software? by OneHundredAndTen · · Score: 1

      Software --> Hardware, as discerning minds already gathered.

    2. Re:Does it still run in old software? by Tough+Love · · Score: 1

      GUI apps on Linux generally work well regardless of which desktop you run them under, and which desktop is "native" for them. This is largely because of freedesktop's work on standardizing the relatively few desktop APIs needed, like tray docking and notifications.

      --
      When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
  6. Why not completely drop it then? by SurenEnfiajyan · · Score: 4, Interesting

    So why not completely drop it then replacing with Mate or XFCE? What advantages does LXDE have over XFCE or Mate?

    1. Re:Why not completely drop it then? by samwichse · · Score: 1

      I'd guess it's because Xubuntu (XFCE) already exists, as does Ubuntu Mate.

      They are continuing to package Lubuntu, but LXDE is now using Qt.

  7. LXDE available on Debian by Tough+Love · · Score: 1

    What is the value add of the Ubuntu part? Honest question. I appreciate that Ubuntu has popularized the Linux desktop, bringing it to millions of users who otherwise would otherwise be stuck on Windows or Apple, but since I went back to Debian, I've been happier. No more having update-manager doing dark and mystical things, then crapping out in the middle of upgrading to a new version for example. And what the heck is a "software channel"?

    For now, running both Debian and Ubuntu on different workstations and laptops, but gradually phasing out all the Ubuntus for Debians, which is just easier to maintain. Other than update-manager vs just dist-upgrade I hardly notice any difference.

    When LXQT lands in Debian I will certainly try it and see how it stacks up against KDE, it's just an apt install away.

    --
    When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
    1. Re:LXDE available on Debian by Tough+Love · · Score: 1

      What is the value add of the Ubuntu part? Honest question.

      Repositories, packages known to work without extra fiddling, and the most forum support.

      Which packages are those, that are supposed to require extra fiddling on Debian but not Ubuntu?

      And what the heck is a "software channel"?

      Repositories.

      So why doesn't Ubuntu say that? What is this "software channel" newspeak? Are Ubuntu users supposed to be too stupid to know what a repository is?

      Sysadmin here .... Don't use update-manager. Waste of time. There is no difference without it.

      Not exactly. The Ubuntu way of upgrading to a new version is update-manager, which edits sources.list and who knows what else it does. The Debian way is, edit sources.list, which has been highly robust for me, unlike Ubuntu update-manager.

      When LXQT lands in Debian I will certainly try it and see how it stacks up against KDE, it's just an apt install away.

      So, a few years ago? Install and try it out. You really should be on stretch and not jessie. Several critical security problems have been flagged as not getting a fix prior to stretch. Worse than anything microsoft has done in years. Dozens of man-hours pinning processes using split repos or portables to get around those problems. Terrible.

      LXQT works fine on Buster. I installed and ran in a parallel session without rebooting or even logging out. Don't you just love Linux? Anyway, LXQT is a bit rough around the edges compared to KDE. Application windows look and work about the same but the task bar is just a black rectange. It probably has a bunch of features I didn't try, but I did drop an icon onto it as suggested by the prompt and it worked as expected. Dragged some windows around fiddled with settings, tried a few tray things. Yes, seems serviceable. But no obvious reason why I should run it instead of KDE.

      --
      When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
    2. Re:LXDE available on Debian by Tough+Love · · Score: 2

      One additional comment: I ran Civ V from the LXDE desktop, where it had thoughtfully placed the icon all by itself. Civ didn't start, but eventually when I logged out of LXDE, Civ immediately started on the KDE desktop. Other apps didn't have any problem figuring out where and when they should start, so this is a Steam bug. The concept of parallel desktop sessions is a foreign concept to the mind of a game developer? Or more respectfully: nobody thought to try this so nobody noticed that whatever hack they did in to make the launcher work isn't quite right.

      --
      When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
  8. fail title by luther349 · · Score: 2

    lxqt is just as light as lxde if not lighter. there switching to qt because gtk is become bloted.

  9. NetBSD by manu0601 · · Score: 2

    There are many other OS to use on ancient hardware. Some cited Slackware, there is also NetBSD.

    1. Re:NetBSD by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      It's not ancient! Jeeze we're talking about machines that were mainstream 20 years ago and had basically the same functionalities as the ones of today: network access, possibly even wifi, usb extension (sometimes 2.0 !), decent multitasking capabilities, a screen, keyboard and mouse.

      Ok they didn't have 64 Gb of RAM to run 3 instances of Chrome but they fared wall and for the most part they still do. The fact that internet browsing now requires gazillions of RAM and processing power is one of the main causes of obsolescence with computers and devices able to access the internet. I'd say it's planned obsolescence...

      I do maintain a lot of those "oldies" for my friends and family and they're very happy about the machines.

      Now if it were a C64 or an Amstrad 1520 that would be ancient...

    2. Re:NetBSD by manu0601 · · Score: 1

      It's not ancient!

      Well, NetBSD does not require hardware to be decades old.

  10. Try FluXuan (Devuan) or Void by Artemis3 · · Score: 2

    FluXuan Is very light on resources. Boot to desktop and its using 68M only.
    Based on Devuan Ascii, you'll be at home if you are used to how Debian used to be, without the bloat.

    Of course you could also just use Devuan with your favorite wm.

    If you don't mind being on the leading edge, there is also Void, which not being based on any other distro, doesn't have to share a sudden termination of 32 bit support.

    There are still many alternatives suitable for old hardware, perhaps take a look at Distrowatch.

    --
    Artix
    Your Linux, your init.
    1. Re:Try FluXuan (Devuan) or Void by johannesg · · Score: 2

      Boot to desktop and its using 68M only.

      It's at times like this when I remember my Amiga 500 booting to desktop, and being just as functional as your Linux desktop, in 512KB. That's "kilobyte", and there was plenty space left over to run applications.

      Ok, technically that's cheating: the Amiga had much of its operating system, including the desktop, in a 256KB ROM. So we should be counting that as well, then...

      Now get off my lawn.

  11. Explain to me how LXQt is not a lightweight distro by kriston · · Score: 1

    Explain to me how LXQt is not a lightweight distro. Go.

    --

    Kriston

  12. Re:Explain to me how LXQt is not a lightweight dis by johnsie · · Score: 1

    You're completely missing the point. "Our main focus is shifting from providing a distribution for old hardware to a functional yet modular distribution focused on getting out of the way and letting users use their computer." The important part here was that they are no longer going to give a crap about old machines. Yes, LXQt may be coincidentally lightweight, but doesn't mean old machines will be catered for in future.

  13. P3-733Mhz by Crass+Spektakel · · Score: 2

    If support for old systems is dropped I will drop LXDE.

    My smallest LXDE system is a PentiumMMX 233Mhz, 192MB RAM and S3 Virge. I use it mostly for its rather rare Audio-Hardware which requires at least two fully ISA compliant Slots which later systems simply do not offer. While is overall quite sluggish it gets the job done with very little suffering.

    Another one is a Pentium III 733Mhz with 384MB of Memory and a Geforce 256. This one works pretty well with LXDE. While Applications take some extra seconds to start they work very well.

    I really like the lean approach of LXDE.

    If support for old systems is dropped I will drop LXDE.

    --
    "Life is short and in most cases it ends with death." Sir Sinclair
  14. I realized most distributions that say "32bit"... by rainer_d · · Score: 2

    still need PAE.

    I have a Fujitsu Lifebook from c.a. 2003 and the realization meant that there are a few systems left with true 32bit support.

    OpenBSD worked surprisingly well. Though any modern app is going to be slow on such a thing. The biggest problem is the 1024MB of RAM it has.

    --
    Windows 2000 - from the guys who brought us edlin
  15. Re:I realized most distributions that say "32bit". by uncle+slacky · · Score: 1

    Bodhi still offers a non-PAE "legacy" version. If you don't like the Moksha (E17) desktop, install LXDE on it you'll have something very like Lubuntu: http://www.bodhilinux.com/w/selecting-the-correct-iso-image/

    --
    Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it.