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 _______________________________________________ use-livecode mailing list use-livecode@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-livecode
