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Ubuntu 12.04 Review: This is the Distro you’re looking for.

lunduke.com

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Re: Ubuntu 12.04 Review: This is the Distro you’re looking for.

#51
post #50

What's with Ubuntu's versioning? 8.04, 8.04.4, 10.04, 10.04.4, 11.04, 11.10, 12.04? I don't understand it. Anyone knows? http://releases.ubuntu.com/

The first number is the release year (8 == 2008) and the second is the release month (04 == April, 10 == October). I really don't know what the third number stands for. At least they're not using it anymore.

For the LTS versions, there are "service packs" of sorts. Indicated by the last number. eg later this year you will see 12.04.1

Re: Ubuntu 12.04 Review: This is the Distro you’re looking for.

#52
post #4

I've tried the beta of 12.04 the past few weeks. Unity is still a pile of ----. Gnome Shell (3) isn't much better and fall back mode (Gnome Classic) is riddled with bugs that basically makes it unusable as a desktop to work on. The Linux desktop has finally officially failed.

LXDE + Compiz is quite nice if you don't want to go full tiling.

Re: Ubuntu 12.04 Review: This is the Distro you’re looking for.

#53
post #4

I've tried the beta of 12.04 the past few weeks. Unity is still a pile of ----. Gnome Shell (3) isn't much better and fall back mode (Gnome Classic) is riddled with bugs that basically makes it unusable as a desktop to work on. The Linux desktop has finally officially failed.

Cinnamon, while still an young project, is great. I've been using it on my desktop for a while now.

Two steps forward, one step back.

Re: Ubuntu 12.04 Review: This is the Distro you’re looking for.

#54
post #7

When i tried out the 12.04 beta on my HP Microserver, installation went smoothly. However when booting up the installed system, all i'd get is a blank screen. Turns out for some odd reason it doesn't set the textmode display correctly, so you need to add a cryptic line to the boot options to see anything. Upon doing this, i found it was throwing a fit at a degraded raid array on a disk i happened to have plugged in a…

You regularly boot with degraded RAID arrays plugged in? I'd want my system to drop everything on possibility of data loss - would seem to make sense.

In this case i was using the machine as network storage, with the RAID1 array being part of a backup. The main system was on a separate disk, so the RAID was in no way required for booting up. In fact, i never explicitly set it up during installation.

Not only could i not see what was going on, i couldn't even access the machine from the network. All for no good reason.

Re: Ubuntu 12.04 Review: This is the Distro you’re looking for.

#55
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

20+ people on my team are using Unity on dual-head setups and it works very well. There was some pain in the transition from Gnome 2 to Unity, but, in general, people are happy and productive. Most have split their desktops into 9 spaces and run all apps full-screen, usually with a terminal on the notebook screen and something else (Eclipse, Emacs) on the larger LCD.

How is the multiple spaces experience? This is my biggest fear. If this isn't very streamlined my productivity is going to go down. It is my biggest gripe with OSX that the "Spaces" functionality requires multiple clicks with lengthy animations in between to navigate the spaces. I could setup keyboard shortcuts but, damn it, a one click panel or dock widget is what I am used to and what I like. This has been included…

Multiple desktops work as expected under Unity - you move between them and both heads follow. It's a very easy way to organize your stuff when you are a spatial thinker. This makes it natural to keep working contexts on separate spaces (editor + terminal, editor + browser, browser + terminal, email + IRC + IM) and easily switch between.

On the Mac, I like the Lion way to deal with it, despite it being unidimensional. The only thing is that you'll need to get rid of the mouse and buy a trackpad (assuming you are on a desktop or with the notebook docked).

I find it confusing when both heads move independently between their own spaces.

Re: Ubuntu 12.04 Review: This is the Distro you’re looking for.

#56
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It says more about the quality of the review than about the relative merits of the 3 systems. These things are simple: If Ubuntu were so much better, or just plain better, than other operating systems, more people would use it. Firefox is, and has been for a long time, much better than IE, and so people use it. OpenOffice/LibreOffice is not better than Microsoft Office, and so people don’t prefer it over Microsoft Of…

The cost of switching is a high barrier for many people. Changing from Windows to Ubuntu requires you to find equivalents for all of the software you need. Changing from your browser -> Firefox = most websites will still work, no additional effort on anyone. Changing from Microsoft Office to OpenOffice forces you to ensure all the documents open correctly and others can open yours correctly. It's not always so black…

I agree but some people still see Internet Explorer as "the Internet" and I would say can't fathom how you use other browsers.

Those same people may also believe Windows is what a computer is.

Re: Ubuntu 12.04 Review: This is the Distro you’re looking for.

#57
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It says more about the quality of the review than about the relative merits of the 3 systems. These things are simple: If Ubuntu were so much better, or just plain better, than other operating systems, more people would use it. Firefox is, and has been for a long time, much better than IE, and so people use it. OpenOffice/LibreOffice is not better than Microsoft Office, and so people don’t prefer it over Microsoft Of…

The cost of switching is a high barrier for many people. Changing from Windows to Ubuntu requires you to find equivalents for all of the software you need. Changing from your browser -> Firefox = most websites will still work, no additional effort on anyone. Changing from Microsoft Office to OpenOffice forces you to ensure all the documents open correctly and others can open yours correctly. It's not always so black…

I agree but some people still see Internet Explorer as "the Internet" and I would say can't fathom how you use other browsers.

Those same people may also believe Windows is what a computer is.

Re: Ubuntu 12.04 Review: This is the Distro you’re looking for.

#58
Multi-monitor support in 12.04/gnome3 is unbelievably good. There are tons of horror stories, that I've lived and that I've read, regarding multi-monitor breaking jut when it's most needed (presentation at conferences, etc). This has happened to me in the past.

Now, my system keeps track of my preferences per-configuration, so plugging in the monitor that I mirror display on automatically does mirroring, and plugging in the monitor I use as a secondary monitor automatically does that. Also, just plug and go for multi-monitor.

It's fantastically better than ever before. Anyone else noticed this?

Re: Ubuntu 12.04 Review: This is the Distro you’re looking for.

#59
post #5

I've also tried beta 12.04, seems ok, but article is a really bit hyperbolic. IMO this ubuntu has similar progress from previous version as other versions in the past. Big surprise for me: I've upgraded 4 years old laptop with new SSD disk and 12.04beta and its really lightning fast compared to windows 7 (altough I have to switch to Unity 2D because of too hot gpu). It really feels like new machine.

Too hot gpu? If you have a ATI graphics chip on that machine, you can try one of the following: - Installing the proprietary drivers (fglrx). https://help.ubuntu.com/community/BinaryDriverHowto/ATI - Properly configuring power management for the libre ones. http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1569512 Disclaimer: I'm not an ubuntu user (debian here)

That's why I have Intel GPUs on my machines. And if I need games, I'll buy a PS/3. As long as they are selling hardware or not getting the bad reputation they deserve, ATI and Nvidia won't fix the problem (of not having proper support for open-source drivers). As it is now, I'd never buy an ATI or Nvidia board for 3D.

If one doesn't want the other using their technologies, make the source public under a non-open license and sue the other if they use it. BTW, offer an easy and automated way to build, test and install the kernel modules.

Re: Ubuntu 12.04 Review: This is the Distro you’re looking for.

#60
post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It says more about the quality of the review than about the relative merits of the 3 systems. These things are simple: If Ubuntu were so much better, or just plain better, than other operating systems, more people would use it. Firefox is, and has been for a long time, much better than IE, and so people use it. OpenOffice/LibreOffice is not better than Microsoft Office, and so people don’t prefer it over Microsoft Of…

Firefox is an interesting example, because on little things it behaves differently in windows to linux. For example - double click the address bar in Windows - highlights a token. Do it in linux, highlights the whole link.

That inconsistency bugs me.

I believe on OS X it does the same thing as Windows.

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