A few days ago, Canonical announced the release of a new desktop environment for Ubuntu, called Unity, targeted at netbooks and touchscreen devices. I’ve been using it since then, and have found some time to write about my experience so far. I can’t say I’m a fan of Ubuntu Netbook Remix, the interface currently targeted […]
A few weeks ago, we took a look at how Ubuntu use varied by country. I’m still on a bit of a demographic kick, so I decided to do some research on another pertinent topic: the median age of Ubuntu users. Here’s what I found. Lest the over-enthusiastic reader scroll down looking for hard numbers […]
I’ve been using Ubuntu 10.04 on a production machine for about 10 days. Now that I’ve gotten to know it better, here are some thoughts on what I like and dislike about the latest and greatest version of the world’s most popular Linux distribution. Overall, I was impressed with Lucid from the first time I […]
Anti-populist geeks often respond to complaints about Ubuntu being poorly documented by insisting that man pages will tell you all you could ever want to know about how your computer works. That may be true, if you’re a geek. But normal people need more than a command-line interface for understanding Ubuntu. That’s where the Ubuntu […]
The official stable release of Ubuntu 10.04 is only days away. That means we can finally list all of the new features to expect in the next longterm-support version of Ubuntu, without having the developers change them every other day. With that in mind, here’s a look at what to expect when you upgrade to […]
Whenever I read the Ubuntu philosophy, I feel warm and fuzzy inside knowing that I’m ostensibly part of a community that champions sharing and transparency. Then the pessimist in my head tells me the only reason I use Ubuntu is because it doesn’t cost money, and I’m cheap. For the four years that I’ve been […]
One of the major new features to expect in future versions of Ubuntu is Gnome Activity Journal, which brings a very refreshing approach to the way users interact with files and data. Here’s a look at how it works. For several decades–since the time when storage devices became large enough to accommodate more than a […]
Ubuntu adoption for communities in the “Third World” seems like it should be a no-brainer: how could a functional, free operating system not prove wildly popular in developing countries? Nonetheless, I believe Ubuntu use outside rich nations remains limited. Here’s a look at some suggested explanations of that reality, and how to change it. Counting […]
As you may have heard, Mark Shuttleworth announced his vision for Ubuntu 10.10 a few days ago. Without prejudicing the more pressing release of Ubuntu 10.04 in a couple weeks, here are some thoughts on what Shuttleworth said, and what we can expect from Ubuntu 10.10 in October 2010. To begin with, it’s worth noting […]
A couple weeks ago, I wrote some posts on GNOME Shell which included a number of criticisms of the desktop environment that will likely become Ubuntu’S default at some point in the future. Jon McCann, lead designer for GNOME Shell, recently got in touch to offer his responses to the problems I found with the […]
One of the lesser-discussed changes to the default Ubuntu application stack for Lucid is the addition of gbrainy to the GNOME games suite. Wondering what gbrainy’s all about? Here’s a look. For a long time, GNOME has shipped with a suite of simple, classic games, such as solitaire, sodoku, chess and clones of Tetris and […]
When it debuts in a few weeks, Ubuntu 10.04 will bring some major changes in the form of a new theme, changes to window titlebars and the advent of the Ubuntu One Music Store. But that’s not all that’s new.
Lest they slip by unnoticed, here’s a look at some less conspicuous–but not insignificant–changes to expect in Lucid.
A few days ago, I installed the release candidate for Gnome 2.30, which provides an overview of what Gnome 3 will look like when it appears next fall. Since I’ve begun using Gnome 2.30, I’ve become more disappointed by the hour with the way it works. Here’s a list of the top five flaws in […]
Back in October, we wrote about Wildfire Games’ 0 A.D., the open-source project aiming to bring professional-quality gaming to Ubuntu and other platforms. I recently had a chance to interview Erik Johansson, project leader of the 0 A.D. team. Here’s what he had to say about the game, and how you can help make it […]
If Gnome developers are to be believed, the desktop of the future arrived last week when the release candidate for Gnome 2.30–which could become Gnome 3.0—was made available. My CPU needed a workout, so I recently compiled the new desktop and gave it a run. Here’s a look at the desktop environment that–like it or […]
This year (2010) marks the 10th anniversary of a lot of things: Tuvalu’s entry into the United Nations, Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon, and the debut of Windows ME, for example. But much more importantly, 2010 marks OpenOffice.org’s tenth year of existence. To celebrate, here’s a look–literally, because there are a lot of screenshots–at how OOo […]
The default positioning of window-management buttons in Ubuntu 10.04 has generated a lot of controversy. But given the decreasing importance of these buttons in modern desktop environments, I’m left wondering if the issue is really so important. In a year or two, after all, window titlebars may be a thing of the past. As I […]
The big news out of the Ubuntu world this month is the radically refurbished look introduced to accompany Lucid when it’s released in April, replacing the orange-brown “Human” theme that Ubuntu users have known and loved–or not–since 2004. Here’s a look at the new face of Ubuntu, with an attempt at abstract thoughts related to […]
A couple weeks ago, we took a look at Lubuntu, a lightweight Linux distribution based on Ubuntu. Since then, the operating system has undergone major changes that merit a revisit of its features. Here’s a second look at the Ubuntu variant that just might replace Xubuntu. When I wrote about Lubuntu previously, I was impressed […]
I wrote recently about legal concerns involving multimedia patents on Ubuntu, and how to obtain licensed codecs without breaking the law. But I didn’t give much thought to the philosophical side of the issue. That’s an important topic in the Ubuntu community, so I’m catching up with it here. The incorporation of proprietary software into […]
