UBUNTU: Ready for primtime? Maybe...

[Shayne]

Software for the everyman NEEDS to have guided wizards and easy installers.  I just cant see my parents opening up the command line and typing in "apt-get install imagemagick" or something.  OSX has software installation down to perfection, MS and Linuxes should steal that idea.

[Tom]

um, thats what the GUI INSTALLER program is for. but when you install _some_ programs using any dpkg front end, you may get a little wizzard asking some questions. Course that depends on the user "level" that's selected on install, and I bet *ubuntu selects n00b, which is why I haven't seen many of them (they default to what the packagers deem sane).

But like I said, _some_ might. Even then, its usually just a matter of start gui package manager, select app, press install, wait, exit package manager, start program".

[Shayne]

Ya, i forgot about that I've only used the server for the last could years and it doesnt have a GUI. Ha Ha.  Pardon my ramblings above

[Lazybones]

Installation of apps wasn't bad but not perfect.

For example Virtual Box is not in the Ubuntu repositories, so I went to its web site where I had the option to download a .deb. Started the download, and much like windows I was given the option to install the program, which then started a wizard...
Very easy.

[Tom]

Or you can add: deb http://www.virtualbox.org/debian gutsy non-free  to the apt sources list, either by editing the file, or via the gui package manager, then it'll keep you up to date

[Cova]

The ATI driver situation on linux is currently kinda in flux.  ATI just recently started releasing drivers with support for the extension needed for Compiz/Beryl (the 3D desktop effects) - you used to need to run all kinds of extra stuff to make 3D desktops work with the ATI binary drivers.  The open-source ATI drivers have been quite good, but only do 3D on cards up to around the R300 generation (the 9800's or so).  And at the same tme that AMD released the new binary drivers with AIGLX support, they also released around 800 pages of specs on the X2000 series GPU's that don't require NDA, and from that a new open-source driver project has begun, called radeonhd (the binary driver is fglrx, the old open-source is just radeon).  Radeonhd isn't ready for use just yet - but when it gets there it'll make all these problems pretty much go away for ATI users, as being open-source it'll just be included with the distro.  Until then, for 3D on recent cards we'll have to stick with fglrx - the first AIGLX release had install issues, but brought big new features, hopefully the next couple releases will clean up the install/bugs.

[Tom]

heck, radeonhd isn't even ready for 2D. Least not on the new HD cards. The specs helped the age old xorg driver be better, but it only does 3d up to r2xx~ and 2d to r300. (yup, can't do 3d on radon 9600s, but can on 8xxx and 9200).

The 2D support for the HD cards was supposed to make it out before Christmas, but it seems they are struggling with it a little over at Novell, so they say don't expect a working RadeonHD driver till next year.

[Lazybones]

Found the cause of my VPN issues.. Turns out they didn't code static IP support in network manager.. Ya, if you use a static IP, NONE of network manager works.


Edit: Apparently this will be fixed in Network Manager 0.7 Which might make it into Ubuntu Hardy Heron... Looks like I came back to test a version too soon.

[Tom]

Interesting, I've seen static IP config in the gui, is it just not connected to anything?

[Lazybones]

Interesting, I've seen static IP config in the gui, is it just not connected to anything?

GNome's network settings let you make the config via the GUI, however network manager does not work unless you have your Interface set to "Enable roaming mode" which clears your static values.

The system works with a static IP however Network manager will not present you with its VPN GUI while the interface is configured this way.

[Tom]

Tell you the truth, I just disable network manager. I don't have a laptop to need it. Right now its centered around mobile wireless devices, so even the "wired" network settings were an afterthought.

Not to mention it wreaked havoc with my already configured settings (fancy bridge setup with a few pre configured tap devices for VirtualBox), NetworkManager would re init the device, thus taking it out of the bridge. woo.