Is Ubuntu moving in the right direction?

[Chiel92]

Thread moved to Recurring Discussions.

Hehe, I tried to create this thread in this subforum, but apparently that isn't possible

[wilee-nilee]

Hi all!

I really enjoy the opensource world and I'm very grateful to all those people contributing to it, especially to the team behind the ubuntu development.
They are doing a great job.

However, I have my concerns about the last few ubuntu releases.
I don't know if it's all caused by unity, or if it's something else.
There is a bunch of annoyances in the desktop environment, which I will not mention here now, as they are not that important, and they are probably known to you.
(They concern window focus, hotkeys and dash functionality.)
Note that these things are not really bugs, but rather annoyances.

There are also a few major issues which I constantly encounter, whereof I will mention the most important here.
- Like in windows, some applications crash randomly and I get an error report request.
It strongly reminds me of those days when I used windows.
- Also, sometimes the windowmanager suddenly crashes or so. Then the window bars dissappear.
- When I press superkey-w in order to get an overview of all my applications, the whole desktop glitches like a big grey whirlwindoze.
And there is more.

I am just wondering: where is the fast stable ubuntu that I knew as lucid lynx?
Is this gonna be regular, or will it get better next releases?

My second question is: How can I get a good stable system? Will installing a different Desktop Environment (Like gnome 2, from ubuntu 10.04) solve the problems? Or do I really have to move to debian?

Kind regards!

Adaptation is how a species survives in the wild, and how a person gets through life without mulling on trivial stuff and improves.

As a species, humans have had the exact same brain for 250,000 years it is adaptation that brought us where we are today.

[sloggerkhan]

Why so?

Change the window dressing. It's still Linux under the hood.

You can make it a Cadillac or a screaming street rod. Nobody is forcing you to stick with the default.

And yes, it is tending towards consumers. Why shouldn't it? Novices can use Linux, can't they? You can still have it your way if you want.

Basically I don't like having to reconfigure stuff that doesn't match my needs. I view it as wasted time. That's all. I don't dispute that you can change lots of stuff about Ubuntu.

I might come back later to explain in more detail, but that's the gist of it.

[Skara Brae]

Adaptation is how a species survives in the wild, and how a person gets through life without mulling on trivial stuff and improves.

As a species, humans have had the exact same brain for 250,000 years it is adaptation that brought us where we are today.

I am noticing how computer programs are coming to a point where they are just "finished", meaning they have reached their maximum in terms of user-friendliness.

Firefox. MS Windows. Ubuntu. To name just a few.

Still, the developers continue "developing" their software, and in my personal opinion things start getting less "finished" than they were. And then things only go downhill, proverbially speaking.

I am afraid that Ubuntu may turn into something that I will no longer like (like, I am now thinking of Unity), and then I will have to switch to another distro, sadly. I realise that this is, as most things, personal (but still) and, so, discussing this does not really have a point.

[zombifier25]

I am noticing how computer programs are coming to a point where they are just "finished", meaning they have reached their maximum in terms of user-friendliness.

Firefox. MS Windows. Ubuntu. To name just a few.

Still, the developers continue "developing" their software, and in my personal opinion things start getting less "finished" than they were. And then things only go downhill, proverbially speaking.

I am afraid that Ubuntu may turn into something that I will no longer like (like, I am now thinking of Unity), and then I will have to switch to another distro, sadly. I realise that this is, as most things, personal (but still) and, so, discussing this does not really have a point.

Regarding software developing, you have no idea how wrong your statement is.

[Docaltmed]

I honestly, for the life of me, can't figure out what people's attraction to drop-down, nested menus is.

First you have to remember in which category you stashed your application, and then you have to run up and down the category list until you find the application, then click to get it, then you open the program, then you open the file browser within the program, scroll up and down that until you find the file you want, click on the file to open it.


Meh. With Unity, I hit a key, type a word from the filename (or even a word in the file -- I've got the recoll scope installed), pick my file, click, I've got it.

Better yet with music! Hit Super, type in part of the name of a song I want to listen to, Dash gives me a list of matching songs, another click and I'm listening.

You want to spend your life wandering through drop-down menus, if that suits your speed, that's fine. For some people, they work very very well.

But, frankly, you would have to drag me back with horses, kicking and screaming the whole way, to get me to use an old-school interface like Gnome 2 again.

[wilee-nilee]

I honestly, for the life of me, can't figure out what people's attraction to drop-down, nested menus is.

First you have to remember in which category you stashed your application, and then you have to run up and down the category list until you find the application, then click to get it, then you open the program, then you open the file browser within the program, scroll up and down that until you find the file you want, click on the file to open it.


Meh. With Unity, I hit a key, type a word from the filename (or even a word in the file -- I've got the recoll scope installed), pick my file, click, I've got it.

Better yet with music! Hit Super, type in part of the name of a song I want to listen to, Dash gives me a list of matching songs, another click and I'm listening.

You want to spend your life wandering through drop-down menus, if that suits your speed, that's fine. For some people, they work very very well.

But, frankly, you would have to drag me back with horses, kicking and screaming the whole way, to get me to use an old-school interface like Gnome 2 again.

Can I hear a amen brothers and sisters.

[Chiel92]

I honestly, for the life of me, can't figure out what people's attraction to drop-down, nested menus is.

First you have to remember in which category you stashed your application, and then you have to run up and down the category list until you find the application, then click to get it, then you open the program, then you open the file browser within the program, scroll up and down that until you find the file you want, click on the file to open it.


Meh. With Unity, I hit a key, type a word from the filename (or even a word in the file -- I've got the recoll scope installed), pick my file, click, I've got it.

Better yet with music! Hit Super, type in part of the name of a song I want to listen to, Dash gives me a list of matching songs, another click and I'm listening.

You want to spend your life wandering through drop-down menus, if that suits your speed, that's fine. For some people, they work very very well.

But, frankly, you would have to drag me back with horses, kicking and screaming the whole way, to get me to use an old-school interface like Gnome 2 again.

Sure, the idea behind the new desktop unity is just awesome.
But the implementation and stability and stuff are not that awesome.

[wolfen69]

My second question is: How can I get a good stable system?

That's easy. Get linux compatible hardware. I've owned/built many computers over the years, and rarely had even a hiccup using linux. Research, knowledge, and the willingness to implement those things learned, are the key(s).

It's really very simple.

[carl4926]

I didn't much like Unity at first. But I've come to love it. Actually I think it has to be said, it's inspired!

There is a nice review in Linux Format of our new 12.04 release, it arrived in my mail yesterday.