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geekhack Community => Other Geeky Stuff => Topic started by: itlnstln on Thu, 29 October 2009, 09:51:00
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Has anyone tried it? What are your thoughts?
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Has anyone tried it? What are your thoughts?
I am currently upgrading my laptop--hoping that the new Intel graphics driver works better then (sucks in 9.04). I'd like to get back the performance of 8.10.
Packages are coming in quickly, apparently no bandwidth problems on the Ubuntu servers (yet?).
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It's weird. When I used to use Ubuntu, I found myself waiting for the next version to fix problems. Then the new one just introduced even more ones and often didn't fix the previous ones. This is one of the reasons I moved to Arch.
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It's weird. When I used to use Ubuntu, I found myself waiting for the next version to fix problems. Then the new one just introduced even more ones and often didn't fix the previous ones. This is one of the reasons I moved to Arch.
Pretty much the same with me and Gentoo.
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Has anyone tried it? What are your thoughts?
Ubuntu is pretty good for a turnkey Linux distro. SUSE is another one like that.
But if you want to really set up a Linux that works great and performs great those two are not worth using.
I use Slackware and it rocks.
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I don't see any visible improvement with 9.10. sensors don't work right and gnome-do has some applets that don't work. Maybe that will smooth out in the next week or so.
Curious to see what gnome 3.0 will look like in the next release.
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GNOME 3.0 looks like one of those crappy, overengineered "next gen" Mac ripoff UIs. I think it's time for me to ditch it in favor of a tiling window manager...
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GNOME 3.0 looks like one of those crappy, overengineered "next gen" Mac ripoff UIs. I think it's time for me to ditch it in favor of a tiling window manager...
Gnome always did remind me too much of Windows...
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for me its KDE that reminds me of windows and Gnome reminds me of Mac. However, the latest KDE is looking pretty good.
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for me its KDE that reminds me of windows and Gnome reminds me of Mac. However, the latest KDE is looking pretty good.
I really don't see how that works either way.
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How what works?
And I'd agree with Bigpook's assessment, KDE is far more obviously Windows-y than GNOME.
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I guess I should say that I am more of a gnome user as it is simpler to deal with. But am trying out the rc release of suse and it looks like KDE has come along way. Don't know if I will switch to it as a daily desktop though.
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Use a WM and you'll like Linux a lot more.
"Fluxbox everywhere"
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Use a WM and you'll like Linux a lot more.
"Fluxbox everywhere"
Gnome and KDE are window managers, as well as full desktop environments.
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Use a WM and you'll like Linux a lot more.
"Fluxbox everywhere"
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Gnome and KDE are window managers, as well as full desktop environments.
What's your point? My point is Gnome and KDE are bloatware for people who want a winbloze-like experience, and they kill the joy of Linux by making it slow and heavy. If you use a WM instead of a desktop manager you're getting more of the benefit and flavor of Linux.
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What's your point? My point is Gnome and KDE are bloatware for people who want a winbloze-like experience, and they kill the joy of Linux by making it slow and heavy. If you use a WM instead of a desktop manager you're getting more of the benefit and flavor of Linux.
Maybe I like wobbly windows.
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Ok but I was talking to the guys who like Linux and don't like KDE or gnome.
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Ironcoder - which WM do you use?
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Fluxbox! Been using it for years. Tried openbox icewm xfce ion and a few more and I always come back to Fluxbox.
I like a clean desktop with no icons, just wallpaper and popup menus, and Fluxbox lets me do that more easily than others I tried. ion had a lot of promise but the maintainer got mad at the X people and went to Winbloze land believe it or not.
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Yeah, I tried Ion and it was cool, but the fact that he went nuts is a bit of a turn off, especially considering that he threatened to sue my distro of choice (Arch)
I've been playing around with Openbox for a bit, but I eventually intend on changing over to a tiling WM like Awesome. A couple of my friends in college use it and have high praise for it.
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Just to have some more options: I use Enlightenment DR16. Stable and somewhat minimalist.
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I've heard of people liking Linux, but I don't use it since most of my software is not compatible with it.
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Odds are that unless you use some very specialized software, that Linux has something that is as good if not better.
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I would jump on Linux permanently if there was a native version of MS Office. Other than that, I can find reasonable to exact equivalents of all the software I use. As a matter of fact, I am thinking about getting an Ion setup and putting XBMC on it for HTPC duty.
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I've heard of people liking Linux, but I don't use it since most of my software is not compatible with it.
I have also heard of people liking windows, but I don't use it since most of my software is not compatible with it. : )
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I've heard of people eating, too.
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So, I've tried Ubuntu 9.04 on my laptop. I hadn't much time for this yet, but I can confirm that the Intel-based graphics are fine now, including wobbly, transparent windows and Expose-like effects. :)
I didn't see lots of other differences, just an overhauled desktop theme (using KDE here), login manager, and the like. The more invisible changes under the hood (Upstart instead of SysV init, more recent Linux kernel, whatever else) do not cause any trouble for me. Everything just works, but more smoothly thanks to the new graphics driver.
Basically, just what I expected. :)
Now, let's join the distribution/desktop environment/OS war... (which was foreseeable, right?)
Let's start this way: my first Linux distribution was SuSE 5.x (maybe 5.1 or 5.2, with FVWM2). That was after a few years of agony with DOS and Win95 that had followed a much better time on Amiga OS; and I was very impressed back then, having an awesome command line AND a usable graphical environment again.
I was not so impressed about the funny configuration tool and package manager in SuSE, so I switched over to Debian about a year later. I would not have ditched Debian if their release cycles for the stable version would have been a bit shorter. Their stable versions featured, sometimes severly, outdated program versions, so I had the choice between Debian Unstable, or compiling all programs I wanted newer versions from by myself. So I chose the latter, but also killed my Debian installation in favor of Rock Linux.
Rock Linux was OK for learning how a Linux distribution really works. Starting with a small base system, I built everything from scratch--very time consuming, but probably worth the experience. I also learned that package managers are a great thing to have... If some of you also would like to learn these things, I guess you should try LFS, Gentoo, Arch, or Slackware today. Use a virtual machine or old PC so not to break anything, though. ;) I also tried different window managers, but most of the time it was Window Maker.
At some point, I decided that I should not spend so much time working on maintaining my working environment, but rather work with an environment that someone else maintains for me... Fortunately, Ubuntu 5.04 had just been released then. It was considered "the better Debian" since it used the same awesome package management system, but came with regular release cycles and thus more recent software, so I gave it a try. Gnome was not exactly what I wanted then, and I started using IceWM, later switched to KDE (because I like a lot of options to play around with ;) ).
I still like Ubuntu for desktop PCs. Ubuntu does many things The Right Way, IMHO; at least, the good things (easy installation and upgrades, reasonably up-to-date software packages, stable) outweigh the bad things (shipping with unusable KDE 4.1 in 8.10 or bad graphics drivers in 9.04), especially since you can always work around problems. I don't use Ubuntu on my file server, though. I like Debian for that task a lot more because of the same reason I ditched it on the desktop: long release cycles, thus great stability.
The point of posting the whole story of my life here is that I think that the statement "my Linux distro is better than yours" (or window manager/desktop environment) is invalid. In the end, it's just the Linux kernel with a lot of free software around it, and each distribution has its own target audience with specific needs. No need to fight, I say.
I've heard of people liking Linux, but I don't use it since most of my software is not compatible with it.
That's not exactly a good point for, say, Windows. If some software requires you to use a specific operating system, then you are tied to the OS vendor. If you like bondage, this might be right for you, but I prefer a free choice.
Also: I've heard of people liking Windows, but I don't use it since most of my software is not compatible with it. :wink: (oops, bigpook said this already)
Well, at least I could get Windows versions for many of the programs that I use regularly if I really wanted to, so it's not exactly "most" of my software...
I would jump on Linux permanently if there was a native version of MS Office.
I guess you've tried OpenOffice.org already... Did you try installing Windows in VirtualBox and using MS Office there?
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I wouldn't go saying that I am "bonded" to Microsoft since most of my software products are designed for older versions of their operating system which have not been supported in years.
But I like Windows. It was free and it works for me.
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I would jump on Linux permanently if there was a native version of MS Office.
You mean like running it with wine (http://www.winehq.org/) ?
(http://appdb.winehq.org/appimage.php?iId=24240)
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One of the more noticeable improvements in 9.10 for me is the faster boot time. I clocked it at 14 seconds after post to the login screen. I don't reboot much though but its pretty slick that it boots so quickly.
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That is a very good thing. That's the only thing about Windows 2000 that annoys me. It takes a while to get fired up. But it shuts down in 3 seconds. That's not too bad.
From what I have seen, Windows Vista takes forever to start up and shut down. I bet Microsoft worked on that with Windows 7.
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startup and shutdown always take forever for me since I have so many services running. (multiple apache sites, bind slave, etc.)
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For me, Windows 7 loads up faster than XP - based on several machines where I have ran both. I haven't run Windows 2000 natively on any of the machines in question so I can't comment on that.
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Here is some information about 9.10
click (http://www.h-online.com/open/features/What-s-new-in-Ubuntu-9-10-846772.html)
Most of it seems to be under the hood and looks to be prepping for 10.4 in the spring.
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You mean like running it with wine (http://www.winehq.org/) ?
No, the keyword is "natively."
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wine is still something of a crap shoot. Native is ideal.
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Actually virtualization is ideal for 'bloze. Don't let MS run on real hardware!
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Actually virtualization is ideal for 'bloze. Don't let MS run on real hardware!
funny, I didn't think to mention that. Its what I do on my work laptop, win xp runs in a vm and ubuntu is the host. The best thing about doing that for me is that ALL of my work apps run on windows. I do phone systems for a living and have to load a fair amount of stuff to test. Each site I do is different. In the end I have a hosed up registry and hosed up machine. Trust me, it don't take long for that to happen.
Now with windows running in a vm I can take a snapshot before I load all of the apps. When the job is done, I nuke that image and fall back to my last known good.
Its pretty sweet.
I am the only one in my office doing this. Everyone there thinks I am some kind of maniac too. But they are the ones that have to send their machines back to corporate to be re-imaged every six months.
Windows belongs in a vm. At least for me, anyways.
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That sounds like a perfect VM solution you have going, excellent job :)
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funny, I didn't think to mention that. Its what I do on my work laptop, win xp runs in a vm and ubuntu is the host. The best thing about doing that for me is that ALL of my work apps run on windows. I do phone systems for a living and have to load a fair amount of stuff to test. Each site I do is different. In the end I have a hosed up registry and hosed up machine. Trust me, it don't take long for that to happen.
Now with windows running in a vm I can take a snapshot before I load all of the apps. When the job is done, I nuke that image and fall back to my last known good.
Its pretty sweet.
I am the only one in my office doing this. Everyone there thinks I am some kind of maniac too. But they are the ones that have to send their machines back to corporate to be re-imaged every six months.
Windows belongs in a vm. At least for me, anyways.
It sounds like we have similar setups. I also have to use some bloze apps for work so I set up a VM with bloze and configure it with all the basic stuff I want and the stuff I need for work. Then I export it to save a copy. I run that machine until something horrible goes wrong (it has a couple of times) and then I restore the copy and run it. I also have a few machines for apps that don't have any NIX version. It's easy to install once and then clone everywhere. I used to multiboot many systems on one box and I never had the one I wanted up at any one time or sometimes I really needed two systems up so I could rsync stuff across or test certain things. With virtualization and enough RAM you can really make a nice setup.
Now if I can only set up with 24G of RAM like iMav!!!
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For those of you who haven't tried or read anything about Ubuntu 9.10, here is a quite long review for you to read: http://arstechnica.com/open-source/reviews/2009/11/good-karma-ars-reviews-ubuntu-910.ars (http://arstechnica.com/open-source/reviews/2009/11/good-karma-ars-reviews-ubuntu-910.ars).
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is this the newest version of ubuntu OS?? coz if it is, i will order it again online for free from their website..
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yes grasshopper, 9.10 is the latest. Don't know if Canonical is still doing the free cd thing though.
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Actually virtualization is ideal for 'bloze. Don't let MS run on real hardware!
That's the only way I can run it because my computers are too old for hardware virtualization.
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I have been using Ubuntu 9.10 for a few weeks now, and it is the primary OS on my old Micron Transport GX+ 1ghz PIII laptop. It is a fairly light yet modern operating system that has alot of usefull features.
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Ok.
Having used 9.10 for a while to give it a chance.
I like it. Granted, Customisation was needed (CCSM, Emerald and GTK on the Eye candy front, then Flash, Thunderbird, ABP, FireFTP on the 'net setup). I also needed to add in the MediaBuntu repositories for DVD's etc.
I still heartily detest the default network management. it just cannot remember my settings, let alone connect to my AP upon bootup.
But, the Other Half can now use it, and Windows has 2 purposes on my PC now. Photoshop (GIMP still sucks) and NFS games.
Personally, I still go back to Slackware or Gentoo (Most of the above is NOT enabled in those, but this needed to be a config to push my Missus away from Windows, an all out assault on the Eye Candy front), but anything they throw up is usually beyond Her Ladyship's knowledge. She is not by any stretch of the imagination, a Geek.
It's just too much when you need to apt-get or tar -xzvf for the average user that was brought up with windows.
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I have had good luck with network manager in 9.10. I create multiple connections to connect to various devices that I need to connect to. I much prefer it over what win xp has to offer.
Maybe there is a better way in windows but for now I have to manually change my network config every time I need to connect to a device. Its tedious, especially if I am switching back and forth between devices.
Thankfully, more and more, the devices I touch are accessed via SSH or HTTP. Having multiple profiles to choose from in ubuntu makes my life easier.
I have had no issues with the wireless either. It easily knows to connect at work, home and certain customer sites with no interaction on my part.
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I have had good luck with network manager in 9.10. I create multiple connections to connect to various devices that I need to connect to. I much prefer it over what win xp has to offer.
Maybe there is a better way in windows but for now I have to manually change my network config every time I need to connect to a device. Its tedious, especially if I am switching back and forth between devices.
Thankfully, more and more, the devices I touch are accessed via SSH or HTTP. Having multiple profiles to choose from in ubuntu makes my life easier.
I have had no issues with the wireless either. It easily knows to connect at work, home and certain customer sites with no interaction on my part.
I'm wondering if it's because I switch between 2 networks. My AP for net access, and a separate Storage/Backup network that I share with a few neighbours, (Hosted by me).
Ah, who knows... It's not that much hassle to do it manually, and I don't access it more than once or twice a day except for rare occasions, it's just a PITA that it's not automatic, because if I forget to switch networks before I crash out, my Incremental backup just sits there with no Drives to be found.
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You may have something hosed up with network manager. I was running 9.04 on my laptop and network manager would go wonky from time to time. I had to use the command line to change my interface settings when it was like that.
I have since fresh installed 9.10 on the laptop and it has been working fine since.
Linux for the most part is very reliable and very stable. But its not perfect, sometimes things do break.
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You may have something hosed up with network manager. I was running 9.04 on my laptop and network manager would go wonky from time to time. I had to use the command line to change my interface settings when it was like that.
I have since fresh installed 9.10 on the laptop and it has been working fine since.
Linux for the most part is very reliable and very stable. But its not perfect, sometimes things do break.
I fully appreciate that, using Gentoo, Custom Compilation is godamn fast at the end of the tunnel, but has it's pitfalls.
I can live with it though. I removed it and put it back through Synaptic, but still the same. I suspect something else is interfering with it, as this seems to be an isolated problem. I can strill do a manual search with Network manager, and connect to an AP by typing my password, but I just cannot get it o do this automatically (Internet AP as a default, Storage AP as and when). Even tried seperate Wifi Connections (Atheros and RAlink) to get it going, but ran smack into a host of network issues.
Still, The missus know what to do, and that's the important thing in weaning them off Windows.
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just for fun, check the properties of the connection. there is an option for 'connect automatically'. is that flagged?
the issue I had had something to do with permissions. I think your problem may be different.
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just for fun, check the properties of the connection. there is an option for 'connect automatically'. is that flagged?
the issue I had had something to do with permissions. I think your problem may be different.
It is indeed flagged. If I only ever connect to one AP, it works fine automatically. If however, I connect to the storage AP, it's manual from there on in. This works in reverse too.
Still, considering this is a "free" OS, I can't complain too much. It certainly kicks Windows7 into touch.
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I don't have 2 AP to test with so I can't help. If it connects automatically to the first AP then that would be desirable behaviour. I could be wrong, but when you want to connect to the second AP you would have to disconnect from the first then manually connect to the second.
Don't know for sure though. I don't think you can connect to more than one AP at any given time, unless if maybe, they are on different subnets.
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I don't have 2 AP to test with so I can't help. If it connects automatically to the first AP then that would be desirable behaviour. I could be wrong, but when you want to connect to the second AP you would have to disconnect from the first then manually connect to the second.
Don't know for sure though. I don't think you can connect to more than one AP at any given time, unless if maybe, they are on different subnets.
As I do.
And it will connect to the second AP just fine after I disconnect from the first... the first time. After that, connecting to either AP is purely a manual affair, having to select the AP and then type in the encryption key every time (And this is the ballache, my AP's key is 63 characters, mostly ALT codes, and the storage AP is 63 chars, random gibberish - I have a few S-Kiddies near me with a Backtrack3 disk who would love to get in there, just to piss me off).
You can connect to Multiple AP's without a problem on different WLAN cards, but pulling anything over the network from different sources? Can't say I've had wild success with that.
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having to re-enter the key is bogus. there is something wrong with your setup but I can't advise as to how to fix. network-manager is kind of new, I think they introduced it in 9.04. I haven't fully grokked how they are working it.
Kind of like what they did with grub2. and know for something completely different...where did menu.lst go?....
right on the multiple AP's with multiple WLAN cards. traffic should route properly. not exactly the same as your setup but I do connect to wireless and hard networks that are on different subnets at work. I haven't had a problem so far, knock wood.
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In related news, why GIMP was removed from the default Ubuntu installation (http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2009/11/giving-up-the-gimp-is-a-sign-of-ubuntus-mainstream-maturity.ars).
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some people seemed to get all upset over that. don't know why though, it still is just an apt-get away.
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I would imagine that some (many?) of the Linux die-hards are getting butt-hurt over Ubuntu going all Windows-like trying to be mainstream. IMO, if Linux, and specifically, any particular distribution, wants to go mainstream, they are going to have to make these types of sacrifices/usability "improvements" in order to pull users from other OSs, especially if said users are entrenched in their current OS. Like you said, the packages are easy to get for more power-type users. That, and there are other distros out there.
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I guess, its not like gimp is for the casual user anyways. I don't really see why anyone would care either way. I don't see how not having the gimp in the default install would matter though. I don't see a whole lot of windows users going to linux anyways. Linux has more issues for new users then the inclusion or lack of the gimp.
I don't think linux is for the casual user anyway. People try to make it out to be but really its not.
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Good decision I think, although it is a shame since GIMP itself is moving towards more useability with single window interface... I am personally pretty stoked for Gimp 2.8. I think I am ready to switch my main XP box over to Ubuntu when it is released.
Personally would love to use Xubuntu, but it was flaky with network support for me. I prefer the feel of XFCE over gnome (never tried KDE). I just installed Xubuntuy 9.10 on my mother in laws laptop over the weekend. (Still had to maintain a dual boot with XP Home though so she can use Turbo Tax).
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Ugh, Turbo Tax. I left them when they included malware that disabled CD-R/W drives. I use Tax Act now.
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No kidding, I tried to get her to use an alternative, but she is dead set on Turbo tax.
She also insisted I install McAfee on her XP Home install, since they just auto charged her credit card for $40+ for an update. I tried to explain that there were better, less obtrusive (and memory hogging) free apps out there, but for some reason she wanted to stick with McAfee...
I use Avira in XP, and find it to be great for an AV program...
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I just started using MS Security Essentials, and I am loving it. It has a very small footprint, it's unobtrusive, and best of all, it's free.
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Losing GIMP from the default Ubuntu install really isn't a big deal. Any user that is savvy enough to use GIMP in the first place would already know how to install it from the repositories. Actually, anybody who already uses GIMP won't really care anyway since they are already using it and upgrading Ubuntu won't uninstall the software.
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I loaded Ubuntu on one of my crummy old laptops and it's an interesting system. It takes some getting used to though.
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Coming from a different OS I imagine it would. Nothing is where you expect it to be and the simplest things can take forever to figure out.
And we haven't even gotten to the command line yet. That is the gateway to hell for all new users.
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I'm still running Ubuntu 9.04 on my work PC. However, I've switched my netbook from OS X Leopard to Linux Mint 8 (based on Ubuntu 9.10).
Screen shot:
(http://geekhack.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=6046&stc=1&d=1259821873)
I find grey/green to be easier on the eyes than orange/brown. Linux Mint looks nice out of the box. Underneath, it's essentially Ubuntu, and uses the Ubuntu repositories for software.
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I find grey/green to be easier on the eyes than orange/brown. Linux Mint looks nice out of the box. Underneath, it's essentially Ubuntu, and uses the Ubuntu repositories for software.
Does this mean that Mint is Ubuntu, only with a different default theme? That would be wasteful.
The theme is really nice, though.
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It also bundles stuff like non-free codecs and DVD players and othersuch stuff.
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ANY UBUNTU USERS ON HERE?
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ANY UBUNTU USERS ON HERE?
I still have a server or two running an older version of Ubuntu, but most of them have been migrated to CentOS now.