Ubuntu

[Burzmali]

Problem is that I had to know where to go to get that log and be able to ID the likely culprit out of hundreds of lines. You can't expect a new user to do that, so what's going to happen? They'll reboot a couple of times then reach for the Windows disk.

Problem is that Windows users do the same thing. BSOD happens and they can't get in so they reach for their restore disk and reinstall Windows.

I know, and if it crashed and dumped a log, or displayed a kernel panic or something, I wouldn't complain, but it just sits at a black screen waiting for the uber-user that must be using the machine to bang out a triple-bucky and start fixing the problem. Reinstalling can work, but making sure that a novice user doesn't wipe out their /home directory is a craps shoot. A friend of mine's job has him maintaining a few dozen people and groups on Ubuntu and upgrade time is always a nightmare for him.

[Doktor Avalanche]

I saw yet another problem holding Ubuntu back when I run an in place upgrade from 11.04 to 11.10 (I usually only run complete reinstalls for new systems and on LTS releases). Since I had made some serious modifications and customizations to my configuration in 11.04, the upgrade encountered a problem. Fair enough, Windows and Mac have problems upgrading systems that are too far from vanilla too. Unfortunately, the upgrade process didn't notice or didn't mention that it had encountered a problem, and after one successful reboot, X just failed to start and the system sat at a black screen waiting forever. This isn't the first time I've flummoxed an install or upgrade so I dropped to single user mode, checked dmesg, did some googling and I was up and running in a half hour or so. Problem is that I had to know where to go to get that log and be able to ID the likely culprit out of hundreds of lines. You can't expect a new user to do that, so what's going to happen? They'll reboot a couple of times then reach for the Windows disk.

Ubuntu and Linux in general keep getting better and better, but I still can't feel comfortable loading a system that behaves like that on someone with limited computer skills.

That's why I held off on upgrading to 11.10. I'm quite happy with 11.04.

[Brandybuck]

Ubuntu and Linux in general keep getting better and better, but I still can't feel comfortable loading a system that behaves like that on someone with limited computer skills.

One thing I absolutely love about FreeBSD is the smart upgrades. It is written by folks who routinely change configuration files and then update nightly, so they made sure that part works. Sometimes I wonder if the developers working on Ubuntu's upgrade system have actually ever used it on real life systems.

p.s. Of course, FreeBSD is not for those with limited computer skills.

[Burzmali]

Ubuntu and Linux in general keep getting better and better, but I still can't feel comfortable loading a system that behaves like that on someone with limited computer skills.

One thing I absolutely love about FreeBSD is the smart upgrades. It is written by folks who routinely change configuration files and then update nightly, so they made sure that part works. Sometimes I wonder if the developers working on Ubuntu's upgrade system have actually ever used it on real life systems.

p.s. Of course, FreeBSD is not for those with limited computer skills.

I'm perfectly willing to accept my system was in an "unupgradable" state due to the adjustments I'd made. I'm even willing to accept that the Upgrade routine failed to notice, even though it seems my problem was rather common. What burns me is that is failed utterly quietly, even though something as important as the X server failed to load successfully, and the log shows that system was well aware that something was very wrong. If I were to get a call from my mom saying "Oh, my computer isn't booting and it says that modem manager can't find a somethingorother" I can one hand the phone, do a little Googling and have her up and running in minutes, but trying to guide her through parse a dmesg...

Also, am I a bad person for want to strangle whoever thought Unity was the future? Seriously, I want to like it, it's smooth, there are big plans in the works for it. But, for the life of me, I can't get it to do anything useful. It's like they took the bottom tray and the menu system and mushed them together, added one of Steve Jobs's hairs and published.

[Burzmali]

Ubuntu is to computer wonks what British autos were to the British gentry - something that looked spiffy, but whose real intent was to give them something to fiddle with on the weekends.

Three years ago, I'd have agreed with you, however Ubuntu is aimed squarely at the tablet using, Computerized TV buying public these days, largely to the detriment of us "gentry" PC users.

And not that I dislike Unity, it is the perfect desktop composing solution for my netbook, worlds better than what came before and a match for anything Microsoft or Apple have fielded in the small laptop / netbook market and I'm sure it is getting in range of competing with mobile OSes. Problem is that it's still not suitable for desktop use as far as I can tell. Making it work for real work is far too much work.

[Doktor Avalanche]

Ubuntu is to computer wonks what British autos were to the British gentry - something that looked spiffy, but whose real intent was to give them something to fiddle with on the weekends.

Hardly. My mother uses (and loves) Ubuntu.

This is so much better than Windows! Faster, too!

Can't argue with mom and she's not anywhere near what you'd consider to be a computer wonk.

She loves LibreOffice Writer ("Just like Microsoft Word") so much she's writing her doctoral thesis on it right now.

[Burzmali]

Ubuntu is to computer wonks what British autos were to the British gentry - something that looked spiffy, but whose real intent was to give them something to fiddle with on the weekends.

Hardly. My mother uses (and loves) Ubuntu.

This is so much better than Windows! Faster, too!

Can't argue with mom and she's not anywhere near what you'd consider to be a computer wonk.

She loves LibreOffice Writer ("Just like Microsoft Word") so much she's writing her doctoral thesis on it right now.

I'll probably try to transfer my parents onto 12.04 if they haven't bought new systems by then, watching my mother's system crawl despite having the specs to run a Linux distro smooth as silk is painful.

[Doktor Avalanche]

That is all the proof I need to state the obvious, your mom is a member of the British gentry.

Don't let her hear you say that - thems fightin' words.

[Doktor Avalanche]

I'll probably try to transfer my parents onto 12.04 if they haven't bought new systems by then, watching my mother's system crawl despite having the specs to run a Linux distro smooth as silk is painful.

My mom saw me hammering on Ubuntu the other day asked what it was. She said it looked really neat and was amazed how fast the applications load up.

So I put a loopback partition on her existing XP system. Now I can't get her to stop using it.

She then asked me if Ubuntu ever gets infected with viruses. I told her it doesn't and it's very likely to stay that way into the foreseeable future unless Ubuntu becomes as popular as Windows.

Personally, I'm hoping it doesn't. I rather like my indie status.

Things really took off when I taught her how to install her own apps from the CLI.

Code: Select all

sudo apt-get install [application name]

Now she's checking her process statuses, killing runaway applications, writing simple shell scripts...

I think I've created a monster. I don't think I dare show her gcc or g++.

One of things she didn't particularly care for was that Ubuntu, by default, gives you Firefox as your browser - so I went in and kitted her out with Google Chrome.

I also put the Angry Birds app up for her. I don't think we'll be hearing from mom for a while.