[OT] Upgrading to Ubuntu 11.04 Beta

[Richard Gaskin]

Richmond wrote:

> If you have been running GNOME as your window manager, upgrading to
> Ubuntu 11.04 Beta will "hose" GNOME: I know, I did just that; now having to
> use XFCE (which isn't bad in itself, I just prefer GNOME).

A little background for those here who haven't been up on the news with 
Ubuntu:

This month Ubuntu rolls out a fresh new UI called Unity, similar to how 
Apple switched to Aqua and Microsoft to Glass.  IMO Unity is every bit 
as much of an advance over the older UI as the switch the other two 
major OS vendors put into place, but like those others there are some 
users who liked things as they were.

Good news for them: Gnome 2 is still available in Ubuntu 11.04.  Just 
choose that option from the login screen if you prefer it.

Most important for those who've loved Gnome 2 is that Canonical isn't 
making this change by themselves.  The Gnome project itself is leaving 
Gnome 2 behind in favor of Gnome 3, which has far more in common with 
Ubuntu's Unity than either does with Gnome 2.  Gnome 2's days are 
numbered (Gnome 3 will replace it by June), and Canonical is merely 
being proactive about how to manage the change by migrating their UI to 
Unity.

In addition to choosing which desktop environment you use when you log 
in, Ubuntu has two release tracks so folks can pick which one best 
reflects their needs:  LTS and twice a year.

LTS stands for "Long Term Support", and is released on a three-year 
cycle.  The UI remains pretty much locked down, and bug fixes from 
current versions are backported regularly.  The current LTS will remain 
in place until next year.

For those who prefer the very latest Ubuntu is upgraded twice a year, in 
April and October, with the next one being 11.04 (April of 2011).


This 11.04 release is perhaps the most significant UI change in Ubuntu's 
history thanks to the introduction of Unity, a new shell that sits on 
top of the Gnome 2 desktop environment as part of an ongoing effort to 
provide ever greater usability.

I saw Ted Gould's two presentations on Unity at SCaLE back in February, 
and spoke with him at length about it in between.  Ted is one of 
Canonical's top engineers on the Unity project, and his enthusiasm for 
it is rather contagious.

While Unity may be off-putting to some members of the Ubuntu community 
who really like Gnome 2, most of the folks in the Ubuntu forums who 
initially complained about the Alphas have come to like it quite a bit 
as they spend more time with it, which isn't surprising since there are 
sound reasons behind the changes and overall it's coming along quite 
well IMO.

Personally, I feel there are still a couple details that need 
refinement, and from participating in the Ayatana discussion list 
(Ayatana is the name of the community project focused on the Ubuntu 
interface) it seems Unity won't become perfect until the 11.10 release, 
long before it becomes the next LTS.  With Apple's move to Aqua it took 
a few releases to get it right, and I suspect the same will be true of 
Unity.

But even now Unity is pretty nice once you get used to it, and Mac folks 
tend to take to it right away since it sports a global menu bar and 
built-in Dock-like Launcher.

I could go one about Unity's design objectives, where it succeeds in 
meeting those goals and where IMO it still needs refinement, but this 
post has already gotten too long.

Instead, if you're coming to RevLive later this month my session will be 
on Linux deployment, and I'll be devoting a few minutes to showing Unity 
and its implications for both users and developers,

And remember, Unity is part of Ubuntu and Ubuntu is Linux, so this means 
all of you have an opportunity you just can't get with any closed-source 
OS:  it's community-driven and you can directly contribute to the project.

If any of you are interested in participating or have any questions 
about Unity or Ubuntu, feel free to write me directly and I'll be happy 
to help if I can.

--
  Richard Gaskin
  Fourth World
  LiveCode training and consulting: http://www.fourthworld.com
  Webzine for LiveCode developers: http://www.LiveCodeJournal.com
  LiveCode Journal blog: http://LiveCodejournal.com/blog.irv