When I made my Grand Entrance into the world of Linux a little over a year ago, by installing Ubuntu 10.10, I remember the feeling of intense joy at having discovered that I could free myself from the world of Microsoft, Apple, and proprietary software. I spent most of that night exploring my new computorial home, posting on the Ubuntu Forums and trying to erase all trace of my prior involvement in the world of the Software Giants (Deleting my Google account being the part that was the hardest to get myself to do!)... I felt like I had attained technological Nirvana. The Gnome 2 interface was simple enough that I could understand it, yet was not dumbed down so that Bob The Brick could successfully create flashy-looking documents.
When 11.04 came out, I tried Unity. It didn't work for me - in fact, I hated it! It was, and still is, counter-intuitive, slow and very, very buggy. It wasn't an issue, though, while Ubuntu still allowed one to pick the "Classic" mode at login. But when 11.10 rolled around and they removed that option, I deserted. I can't live with Unity, as many others can't and the gnome-session-fallback has moved to Gnome 3, which is almost as bad, so I switched to a system called elementary - which is still running Gnome 2 - but it isn't nearly as good as Ubuntu 10.10 was (The elementary team's idea of everything being nice and ready-to-use out of the box doesn't appeal to me: I like to tweak my OS!), and now it is asking me to upgrade to a new version which is essentially 11.04 all over again. So now, I suppose, I will join the many disillusioned Ubuntu users making the migration to Debian.
The ironic part of all this? Ubuntu was, apparently, originally created as a somewhat lighter, easier-to-use version of Debian. Now Debian is regarded as an easier-to-use sort of Ubuntu lifeboat. Oh, well - what goes around comes around. I only hope Debian stays with good old classic Gnome 2.
Slashdot Mirror
When I made my Grand Entrance into the world of Linux a little over a year ago, by installing Ubuntu 10.10, I remember the feeling of intense joy at having discovered that I could free myself from the world of Microsoft, Apple, and proprietary software. I spent most of that night exploring my new computorial home, posting on the Ubuntu Forums and trying to erase all trace of my prior involvement in the world of the Software Giants (Deleting my Google account being the part that was the hardest to get myself to do!)... I felt like I had attained technological Nirvana. The Gnome 2 interface was simple enough that I could understand it, yet was not dumbed down so that Bob The Brick could successfully create flashy-looking documents. When 11.04 came out, I tried Unity. It didn't work for me - in fact, I hated it! It was, and still is, counter-intuitive, slow and very, very buggy. It wasn't an issue, though, while Ubuntu still allowed one to pick the "Classic" mode at login. But when 11.10 rolled around and they removed that option, I deserted. I can't live with Unity, as many others can't and the gnome-session-fallback has moved to Gnome 3, which is almost as bad, so I switched to a system called elementary - which is still running Gnome 2 - but it isn't nearly as good as Ubuntu 10.10 was (The elementary team's idea of everything being nice and ready-to-use out of the box doesn't appeal to me: I like to tweak my OS!), and now it is asking me to upgrade to a new version which is essentially 11.04 all over again. So now, I suppose, I will join the many disillusioned Ubuntu users making the migration to Debian. The ironic part of all this? Ubuntu was, apparently, originally created as a somewhat lighter, easier-to-use version of Debian. Now Debian is regarded as an easier-to-use sort of Ubuntu lifeboat. Oh, well - what goes around comes around. I only hope Debian stays with good old classic Gnome 2.