The current state of Ubuntu 12.04 LTS

[z06gal]

Little aside for a heartfelt THANK YOU to the whole Ubuntu project, the Canonical mothership and remixed derivatives like Mint. Had to do some IT support at the old folks' place today and their Vista machine made me very grateful for Linux - that thing is so painfully, excruciatingly slow! Installed the new Ubuntu 12.04 (with Cinnamon for a smooth Windows-to-Linux transition) and everything is fast and hassle-free

Words cannot express my loathing of Vista. It is hands down the WORST operating system I have ever seen. I am grateful for it in the respect that it sent me to Linux Awful, awful os

[craig10x]

my friend is trying to get me to re-install windows 7 on my laptop (that is what it came with and i have the reformat discs) and then set up a dual boot with ubuntu...i never used it when i got this new laptop (other then making the restore discs...lol) and then wiped it off...he tells me it's such a huge improvement over vista and that i would love it...that it is very smooth, reliable and fast...I am rather skeptical though

has anyone used it for a prolonged period of time?...i suspect it isn't worth me bothering with but was just curious...

as a side note...i may add cinnamon session to my ubuntu so i can play with that too...but the windows thing...hmmm...not so sure

[bimsebasse]

Windows 7 is quite good, a vast improvement over Vista but that's not saying much. I've been using it for years but the last two I was such a rare guest in Windows that I eventually stopped dual booting with Windows and now only have various Linux distros on the laptop.

[craig10x]

yes...i don't think i will want to bother with it...there really isn't anything i would want to do in windows as compared to what i can't do in linux...

by the way, when Cinnamon session is added to ubuntu, do you get updates in the update manager for it?
also, i assume it just appears as a separate session you can log into when booting up ubuntu?
and has no (negative) effect on the unity session?

[bimsebasse]

Yes it just creates a separate Cinnamon session (several, actually, as it pulls the whole Gnome session package) - you can still choose Unity or Unity2D and run those normally. Updates come automatically in the update manager (no matter what session you're in).

[craig10x]

Thanks
I'll have to give it a try...

[KBD47]

Little aside for a heartfelt THANK YOU to the whole Ubuntu project, the Canonical mothership and remixed derivatives like Mint. Had to do some IT support at the old folks' place today and their Vista machine made me very grateful for Linux - that thing is so painfully, excruciatingly slow! Installed the new Ubuntu 12.04 (with Cinnamon for a smooth Windows-to-Linux transition) and everything is fast and hassle-free

I'm feeling a bit better about Ubuntu after this release. It takes some tweaking, but Ubuntu can be made into a very useful operating system by just adding Any other desktop--apologies to those who love Unity--Gnome Fallback, MATE, Cinnamon, Xfce, KDE, etc.
I think Mint 13 is going to be pretty awesome
KBD47

[Myself]

After installing Gnome 3.4.1 I have a problem with Cinnamon and Unity taking over 5 minutes to produce a usable Desktop but Gnome is almost instant. I prefer Cinnamon as Unity I find to be too clumsy and awkward to really be usable on a daily basis (some of the Lenses are nice but ...) but a 5 minute wait after log-in to a usable Desktop with Cinnamon is like going back to using old Windows Vista.

[z06gal]

Windows 7 is quite good, a vast improvement over Vista but that's not saying much. I've been using it for years but the last two I was such a rare guest in Windows that I eventually stopped dual booting with Windows and now only have various Linux distros on the laptop.

Windows 7 is much better than Vista but it is painfully boring to me. Linux, especially the stability of Mint, has really spoiled me because of the fact that it can be customized and is just plain fun to use

[ashtonford]

I started out Linux with ubuntu 8.6 and enjoyed using it untill they tried to force feed unity on users. The newest incarnation is a mess and buggy with nothing great or fantastic. Mint12 is a much better option out of the box. Everything works, ready to go out of the box. When ubuntu lost its focus and stopped listening to what its users wanted, as well as putting on blinders and only thinking about the tablet market etc that was the beginning of its down fall.

Glad to hear you are enjoying mint...and i have always been a big fan of it too and have used it quite a bit (although i am currently using ubuntu 12.04 w/unity)...

Unity is NOT a tablet interface at all...it's a dock-centric way of doing things (kind of like the mac) except on the left side instead of the bottom of the screen...
Also many who did not care for unity in it's earlier editions (11.04 and 11.10) now absolutely love it in the latest (12.04) and it keeps improving all the time...
So, while you may not care for it...many do enjoy it...

I would say a "key" thing to liking it, is one must use it with an open mind and positive attitude for several weeks and at that point they would either like it very much...but if they didn't (at that point)...well, at least they would have given it a fair chance...

I didn't care for it much when i first used it, but after doing what i just outlined above, i was amazed how my attitude changed and i got to like it a LOT...

http://kbd-thinkingoutloud.blogspot.ca/ ... -1204.html look at the last paragraph of this article. This person also agrees that ubuntu is too focused on the tablet and cell phone market with unity.

[craig10x]

Interesting article...however, just because ubuntu is coming out with tv, cell phones, tablets, etc has nothing to do with the fact that Unity is NOT a tablet interface but as i said, a "dock-eccentric" interface like the Mac...true, they are going for a uniform look for all their devices but no doubt they will work differently on those other devices...

Windows 8 is so much more like a tablet interface...
He also praises ubuntu 12.04 in the article once he gets it set up the way he happens to like it...however, as he mentions those who like Unity (like i do and MANY others) will absolutely love this release...

I do make the unity bar smaller in size (because i think it looks better that way) and have it set to "autohide" but otherwise i find it easy to work with and do not really miss the conventional (slab or fan style) menu at all...actually, i never did like a fan-out style menu like old ubuntu (i prefer using a search bar) but i do like the "mint style" slab menus...

[bimsebasse]

Windows 7 is quite good, a vast improvement over Vista but that's not saying much. I've been using it for years but the last two I was such a rare guest in Windows that I eventually stopped dual booting with Windows and now only have various Linux distros on the laptop.

Windows 7 is much better than Vista but it is painfully boring to me. Linux, especially the stability of Mint, has really spoiled me because of the fact that it can be customized and is just plain fun to use

Hehe, same here, I had no issues worth mentioning with XP and Windows 7 and can't join the Windows booing threads (unless the subject is Vista) but Linux is just so much more interesting and fun to use, you can mold and personalize your install beyond recognition in every direction whereas a Windows install is definitely not a toy

[drumBE]

windows = reboot , linux = beroot

[z06gal]

windows = reboot , linux = beroot

This made me LOL

[zerozero]

just want to add here this http://www.webupd8.org/2012/05/how-to-i ... n-pae.html
- in short the new ubuntu lts brings a pae kernel instead of the traditional i386 meaning that older hardware won't be able to run it.
- and according to several bugs https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+sour ... bug/930447 and https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+sour ... bug/897786 just to mention a couple, older hardware means Thinkpad T42, Thinkpad R51, EeePC 701, Thinkpad X40 (these are just the ones mentioned in the bug reports i saw, but it means basically no mint13 for all the Pentium M at least)

regarding ubuntu, we see a couple options:
- the upgrade from previous versions (with all the issues that it brings https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+sour ... bug/876146)
- net-install;

and Mint?

[KBD47]

I admit I pretty ignorant about the pae thing, but I believe Xubuntu is using non-pae for 12.04 release.
Just read your first link and he suggests installing Xubuntu 12.04 and adding whatever desktop you want, which makes sense to me.

[esteban1uy]

I have Lubuntu 12.04 installed in a pretty old Dell Cpx H (Pentium III) with the default (non-pae) kernel and it works really well.
Aren't the LXDE editions of Linux Mint based on Lubuntu?

[mintybits]

The wallpapers are excellent.
Seems fast and stable so far.
The default desktop is highly localised, specifically to the Isle of Wight.

Cinnamon remedies the default desktop for me.
Traditionally, the Mint team takes Ubuntu and adds the missing bits and upgrades the accessories and gives it a darned good polish so I don't have to.
Looking forward to Mint 13.

[Myself]

Unity is just annoying and frustrating! Has some nice features but...

Just spent a week using 12.04 and Cinnamon makes Ubuntu 12.04 much better for every day use.

Had several crashes with Cinnamon but Ubuntu does not accept the error messages and neither are they sent to Linux Mint so I wonder how these errors will get fixed.

Other problem with Cinnamon is that when trying to access an application on the menu it 'sticks' and doesn't respond for minutes. After it starts to work again it's fine for hours until next time it 'sticks'.

I found that Ubuntu 12.04 does need to be Rebooted every now and again, just like old Windows, to resolve slow performance after heavy use with many applications.

Like LMDE Xfce which has Tumblerd for updating file icons in Thunar, Ubuntu also also a similar stupid program that runs the processors at maximum especially when the processors are desperately needed by applications.

In Ubuntu 12.04 switching back and forth between Folder results in annoying waits for Folders to be reorganised. Not seen this with any other distribution where the Folders are instantly displayed.

Another issue with 12.04 is that if I set it to perform work over night, requiring about 60% use of the processors, sometimes in the morning I discovered no work done as Ubuntu 12.04 had Rebooted itself so it's not as stable as other distribution I use to do the same work like LMDE.

[bimsebasse]

Help! I'm becoming an Ubuntu user again, need the support and guidance of the group

12.04 with Cinnamon and Gnome Shell is excellent so far and generally suits me better than Mint 13 with Cinnamon. If only you could have the refinement, polish and dev man hours of Ubuntu and the short distance between dev and user plus the community of Mint (Ubint? [Todo: come up with different name]) instead of having to choose.