back to article Ubuntu does bird beta

The folks at Canonical are asking the faithful to get their bird on with the release of Ubuntu 8.04 – Hardy Heron. Both the desktop and server versions of the LTS (long-term support) operating system have been put up for grabs. In addition, you’ll discover beta versions of the various Ubuntu offshoots such as Kubuntu, Xubuntu, …

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  1. John Wards
    Linux

    ActiveDirectory....

    The most interesting feature is the active directory support, which is great for trying to convince the boss that simple desktops with ubuntu can be dropped in on a windows 2003 network.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hardy Heron - blah

    I think I would have gone with something with a but more gusto, like 'Horny Hippo'.

  3. Michael Habel
    Linux

    So long Microsoft... Hello Mythbuntu!!

    I personaly use Mythbuntu and well I like it!

    It's like having a DBox2 ;) with PVR Functionality.

    The only downside that I can see (as with Mythbuntu 7.10), is the lack of a stable Stand-by Mode, as much as I'd rather not shell out the Dosh for a full-blown Realbox with HD (H.264/MPEG4) Decoder (e.g. DVB-2) @ ca. €1,300.00(EUR), I can see that that "Box" would eventually bring a return on the Electricbill ~eventually~ whill the C2D @3.Ghz GF7900GS 2GiB's DDR2 RAM et-al wii burn more coal then I'd like.

    But...

    1) This HTPC System trunced my Desktop and I somehow find more joy browsing the Net in 16:9 on a 32" LCD Panel.

    2) I'm still waiting for Microsoft to support something other then ATSC or the DVB-T standard's. >:-(

    I wish some one from Microsoft HQ Europe would fly over to Redmond and start kicking someons' Arse for not at least supporting the DVB-S(2) standard never you mind about DVB-C.

    Mythbuntu thankfully does support these Systems (Note: I'm stll about a Month ~or so~ away from actually testing DVB-S2 so allthough I'm under the impression that id should work, I'm not 100% on it. love to hear form someone with such a setup if possible...

    In anycase Mythbuntu has saved me from Fista Hell so for that I'm gratfull...

  4. Matt Caldwell
    Thumb Up

    I'll definitely install it..

    as a virtual machine. I'm still running Dapper and I see no reason to upgrade. I have a small partition with a Gutsy install. The only reason I have it is to put files on my iPod classic. libgpod2 compiled in dapper but I couldn't figure out how to make the system not use the libgpod0 which was in the repos. I liked some of the ways Gutsy was setup, but not enough to wipe my Dapper install just yet. I've had it for a year and a half, and EVERYTHING on my laptop works beautifully, I'm kinda hesitant to mess it up.

    Anyway, I'll try Heron in a VM and probably upgrade once Its final and has been out for a while, maybe by June or so. I like that it is LTS, as through the school year I need something that works and is config'd.

    So the torrent is coming in right now, and I'm pretty excited, but we'll see. If more things work out of the box than did with a fresh Dapper install then I'll give it a go. I just wish they had a convenient settings transfer app in the install that would carry over my themes, user directory, login screen, settings, etc. automatically.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    My Windows XP runs faster

    ( Pardon My English )

    I used Ubuntu ........ but in my experience it was kinda slower than my windows xp

    I never got BSOD from Windows XP and i never used bloatware like norton , mcafee

    I hav 3.2 Ghz pentium4, 80 GB HDD and 512 Ram...

    im downloading xubuntu cd image .. guess that will run faster l.

  6. Bruce Leyden
    Coat

    @ David Wiernicki

    For more gusto, Spoonerisms are your friend... How about Hery Hardon?

  7. Sirus Black
    Boffin

    Bottom Line Is. .....

    If You Know What To Do and How To Use And Have a Little Common Sense .....

    Windows XP Kicks @$$ ..

    still im gonna try xubuntu ...

  8. chris

    RE: I'll definately install it...

    They do have an upgrade tool

    type

    sudo upgrade-manager -d

    should transfer the majority of your settings across

    Been running the alpha for months now, works great.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    It's still beta

    Your writeup implies that the desktop version is fully released - it isn't, all this is is the first beta.

    Still works great on my PC and laptop though. Nice work open-source dudes :)

  10. Colin Wilson

    failed at the first hurdle

    Nicely put together, simple and effective installer front-end for newbies, but on my box using Wubi, the first "user-interaction" upon rebooting asks me what settings I want to import or click forward to bypass. I can't bypass OR import settings, as the "forward" button never becomes active.

    Off to file a report with Canonical now !

  11. Henry Wertz Gold badge

    Fair warning though..

    Fair warning though.. since it's under heavy development, 8.04 has RIDICULOUS numbers of updates. I have a virtual machine with it, and it'll have like 150 updates a week.. 7.10 is pretty polished, and it seems 8.04 will be even more so.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    Went back to Debian

    I ran Ubuntu / Kubuntu for a while but went back to Debian. What's the point? More chrome but far less stable.

    Also, you've got to wonder what Canonical's business model is?

    gOS looked like two fingers from Google, i.e. we're not buying your brand Messrs. Shuttleworth - if we want to do it ourselves we will.

    Where's Canonical going? A pure services play?

    Whatever it is, I wouldn't run an OS from a company that hasn't and probably won't make a profit in the foreseeable future.

  13. Robbie
    Happy

    debian vs ubuntu

    For some reason i like debian beter to. guess its personal preference. And i think debian has a bigger repository.

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    gOS

    Hasn't google always run their own customized linux kernel, why on earth would they even consider Ubuntu,

    Yeah, if I was in charge of google I would not release with Ubuntu, google has the inhouse knowledge and muscle to roll their own. And to be fair one person could probably do a linux distro nowadays - may not leave too much time for anything else - but a team of say 7 could do it quite easily.

    Ubuntu is just a shot at charging home users for support - but I too think they are on a hiding to nothing there. Home support will always be the computer friend of yours, people don't want to pay to type a config correctly. Businesses will always get their own inhouse support - and if you have to go to the distro maintainer for support there you either have the wrong distro or the wrong support staff. Even a SOHO is hard to support unless you have been on site, those are the ones who pay for one year and then get someone in, and never pay for support from the distro maintainer again.

    gOS is more of a brand building exercise for google, it would not surprise me if quite a few in google didn't use gOS day to day, why not release it.

    In truth Ubuntu is for the folks who missed the earlier Linux buses, or the one you tell people to install when they moan about windows. They need to keep the hype going though - Ubuntu is the main entrance point to unix for Window's users and it does look like gOS may steal some of the thunder. Better for gOS to pull the rug out from under Ubuntu in a year or two, rather than today.

    In some ways I wish he had instead just made a commercial games company that did first release for Linux, that I think would have made more of an impact. The games could be ported to windows a few months later, but the game's scene really does drive the IT industry, and you would have had people dual booting just so they could be first in the queue. There is also quite a lot of developers who would like to make a living making Linux games, but so far the business side of this has been very mismanaged with all the high profile companies going out of business. Still, the smaller outfits always tend to offer a linux version and of course conversion is not that hard as long as you bear it in mind during development.

    And it didn't just have to be games, it could have been music, sure rosegarden is good, but anything to make the installation simpler, and the programs more robust would have been welcomed, people would buy it. If an as good as cakewalk application was released on Linux they would make the sales.

    So, yeah I think Ubuntu should reposition to now try and make commercial software sales of Linux software to home users viable and drop the support idea or at least minimise it,

  15. Brad
    Thumb Down

    It doesnt matter

    I tried ubuntu, i really did but in the end i went back to windows, like most home users i just couldnt be bothered having to learn how to do something that should be so simple.

    Im not a Gates fan or anything like that, i know everything has its faults, but i run my firefox with noscript, my AV and FW and my PG2 and of course my common sense, i have never needed anything more and have never had a virus or other security issue when using these. I can run all the programs i like and install them at the click of a mouse, customise everything and the best thing is it has cost me as much as Ubuntu would.

    Until they bring out something that i can use and not have to spend hours upon hours learning how to do simple things, i wont be using it.

    Thumbs down because the only real windows alternative doesnt cut it.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    It doesnt matter By Brad

    Ever wondered how much time you spent learning to use Windows, Brad?

    Surely with your computer knowledge and common sense you can work out how to use Ubuntu?

    Or was it out of your comfort zone?

  17. Chris
    Paris Hilton

    @Brad

    Hi Brad,

    Did you wake up one morning and knew exactly how Windows worked? Wow, impressive stuff.

    More to the point: I do believe that people that are satisfied with Windows should use it. Hell, I use MacOSX, Win2000, WinXP, PCLinuxOS, SimplyMEPIS, CentOS and Mandriva2008. Why, because that sort of thing interests me. Windows is purely at work (developer), and the rest of the OS's is purely at home for fun and learning.

    If you start up Ubuntu and don't give it a proper chance to get to know it, you base your decision that it isn't any good on nothing much really. Maybe you just didn't like the look of it?

    I've been using Linux since RedHat 5.0, and believe me, it has been infinitely more fun than using Windows. You can make it look and behave exactly as you want, everything can be changed to how you personally like it and the amount of new software you can install and use for free is mind-boggling. But hey, to each his own.

    If you want an 'easier' way of trying Linux, give PCLinuxOS a try, running that one is a no-brainer for those who can't be bothered too much, but would still like to give Linux a try.

    Last thought: Ubuntu is not the only Linux out there. Depending on your hardware/knowledge/time, another distribution might fit you better.

  18. This post has been deleted by its author

  19. Eponymous Cowherd
    Thumb Down

    Re:My Windows XP runs faster

    Hmmm,

    Well, I have Kubuntu on an old 600Mhz Dell Inspiron 7500 with 256K RAM. That machine appears faster and more responsive than my Dell Latitude D810 (1.9GHz and 1GB RAM) running XP Pro. It starts faster, closes down quicker and crashes less often (well, the Kubuntu machine has *never* bombed. The D810 BSODs once a week, at least).

    The biggest difference I notice between the stability of Linux and Windows is the complete absence of 'bit-rot'. My home Debian box has been set up for 3 years and appears just as fast and responsive as it was on day 1. Every Windows desktop box I have ever owned has become almost unusable in that time (takes ages to boot, ages to shut down and generally much slower to do anything).

  20. Chris Matchett

    Barriers to entry

    Windows has it.

    So what if we once learned Windows? It doesn't meant we have to learn something else to get a similar result. Lazy? Maybe... but so what?

  21. Kevin Reilly
    Thumb Up

    Ubuntu & Notebooks

    I am a Mac user on the desktop (Intel Mac mini) but I think Macbooks are fragile & overpriced. So I invested in a 120 gig hard drive for my Thinkpad X30. This is partitioned 90 gig Ubuntu 30 Gig XP. Using www.fs-driver.org Windows can read & write to Linux partitions, thus my Linux home folder is also my documents for Windows. Also Ubuntu does target disk mode over firewire from the Mac, & will print to the Mac's printer over Ethernet as Bonjour support is built in. All in all this is a very handy tool both for home & away use (3g USB modem & wifi both work fine in both OSes)

  22. Chadd Hall

    Better names???

    It should have been Horny Hamster, but with Dell being aligned, that wasn't going to happen.

  23. Chadd Hall

    Gusto?

    We can always hope for Randy Rhino in a few years...

  24. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    With Dell onboard

    it should have been Peking Duck.

    Bit-rot occurs when a program does not get updated and starts to fall out of sync with libraries. This happens actually more on unix systems as there are so many releases, hence the importance of the package manager and keeping uptodate. It also means applications do need maintainers.

    The slowdown on windows machines occurs because the registery becomes bloated over time, amongst other things.

  25. tony trolle
    Linux

    so much

    to try server 2008 AND this and so few machines (working) Virtual machines here we go. Arrrr which one; DAMM.

  26. Horridbloke

    @Chadd

    We can look forward to Kinky Kangaroo, Lusty Llama and Nymphomaniacal Newt first.

  27. ImaGnuber
    Linux

    Linux desktop

    I'm tired of hearing people say Linux isn't ready for the desktop. I'm no geek and I've been using it as such for years (Mandriva).

    And when I say I'm no geek I'm serious. Got no use for the command line or compiling from source or blah blah blah. Linux just works and it has 'just worked' for a long time.

  28. Colin Wilson
    Linux

    ref: AC / gOS

    Google are not developing gOS, it just looks that way due to the very tight (aka slick) integration into the user interface.

    You can see from their site (http://www.thinkgos) that they clearly state "gOS is not affiliated with Google or their partners."

  29. Steven Raith
    Go

    New Ubuntu?

    I'm happy with 7.10 at the moment, thanks - it's been running wonderfully on my old Tecra A2 [Centrino 1.7ghz, 768mb] and makes Windows look like an idiot child in terms of how it runs on this platform.

    I might well use Wubi to pop 8.04 on my main desktop machine and see if the support for SiliconImage 3112 RAID arrays is any better though. Can't live without my extensive pr0n collection, regardless of the OS.

    Ubuntu = a very nice way to wank and bank. Mind you, it seems that a little something called VirtualBox will allow me to seamlessly run Windows apps within Linux. I think I will have a play with that....

    Steven R

  30. Martin Usher

    It just works

    I've used several different modern distros of Linux -- including various Ubunutus -- and they just work. I don't run a laptop that hibernates with them, though -- but then Windows is always getting things wrong when it Hibernates systems so I try to avoid letting the systems go into that state, I just switch things off when I'm not using them.

    The thing I like about Linux is that it truly multitasks. Windows still hasn't quite got the hang of process switching and their user model is weird.

  31. Michael Warburton

    Hibernate/suspend

    The hibernate/suspend issues are usually graphics driver related, and fixable.

    See... http://ubuntulinuxtipstricks.blogspot.com/2008/03/ati-nvidia-resume-good-news-bad-news.html

  32. Anonymous Coward
    Paris Hilton

    Linux = Windows, please?

    Could Canonical please make its Ubuntu more Windows like. We could find all the things in familiar places, working in the similar way. If it also would be possible to run windows applictions just by clicking, without installing kinky emulators, world would be happy. Learning LInux is too much hassle.

  33. Anonymous Coward
    Unhappy

    The Desktop for Other People

    There are Apple fanbois, who are pushy, and Linux fanbois, who are pushier, but Ubuntu fanbois take the cake. On various forums, when somebody asks a question about Windows ("how can I xxx", some sane question), there's always some jerk popping up with "Install Ubuntu". Bzzzzt.

    First off, I've been playing with Linux since Yggdrasil in 1994, and have tried a heap of distros, so I'm no beginner. And frankly I still think Mandriva's the best desktop, though MEPIS has its charms. But I always find hardware issues trying to get Linux on a desktop. Its driver model is so utterly, horribly wrong that it's not even worth discussing. (Kids in university these days learn to be technicians, working on crufty old designs, assuming they were give To Moses on Sinai, and don't have a klew about the principles involved.) All distros have problems, and oddly enough, not with the same hardware. It's somewhat beyond hopeless. Fanbois, of course, swap hardware until it works, or assume that you really don't need sleep or hibernate on a laptop, or wireless, or sound, or 3D, or whatever else doesn't happen to work at the time.

    Ubuntu's specialty is having certain annoying nanny-style oversimplification that a kid who studied Unix will simply assume is what people less educated than himself will need. Linux is a programmer's system of, by, and for recreational programmers, and it's a good server OS (servers being run by techies and having a limited range of hardware). But those recreational programmers don't know what ordinary users need. Ubuntu is like a pork barbecue made by observant Jews who would no more eat it than eat mud, but who think they know what the gentiles want. The less "friendly" (cutesy) distros are a pastrami on caraway rye, not aimed at the masses but at least they know what they like and don't pretend to be for others. And XP (not the execrable Vista), if run correctly (not always obvious), is by now a decent, stable desktop system. Not the mess that the fanbois pretend it is (mostly remembering ME, I suppose).

  34. Bryan Seigneur
    Linux

    The right host OS for VMs

    ImaGnuber:

    I like your handle so much I registered it (gnuber.com) :p

    Tony Trolle:

    I agree. With DDR2 so cheap now it's easy to replace your playground network of frankenboxes with one dual core machine with 4G or more. Put several VM's on it and there is your playground. Of course, to use 4G or more, you need a 64bit kernel.

    I had been using XP and msvpc 2007 for said experimental VM playground, but I finally got Ubu7.04 running last night, knowing it would possibly be a better VM host system than XP. (msvpc nic's don't do pxe, for one.) And I much rather prefer installing 64bit linux than Vista, besides not having a license!

    Ubu7.04 let me get my nVidia 8400GS running with full openGL accell and 2 screens in a couple of reboots. I've even installed Unreal, Urban Terror, and WoW (on Wine) which are the only things I need that I can't just run in a VM. I forgot to use the 64bit load, though. I'll try that with 8.04 beta here.

  35. John F***ing Stepp

    Of two installations.

    The second Ubuntu installation went real well (if you don't count the manual partitioning) and probably saved a friend from being dropped by his ISP, he had been zombied out.

    The first, my wife's, (because she had friends over and keyboard loggers are a pain.) is slower than windows because.

    19200? What kind of default modem speed is that?

    Okay, simple enough, just go to dev/whatever and change the damn string.

    Except that what Ubuntu does real well is to emulate the windows help system.

    Which is to say it could suck start a Harley Davidson that had holes rusted in the muffler.

    Going to console mode and consulting the man pages led me to believe that I might possibly have installed the wrong version of Linux.

    M A N U A L pages, as in this is how we put it together; don't copy the damn things from the back issues of some Unix manual.

    I told my wife that we would absolutely have to get broadband, 'cause you have to think positive.

  36. Leona
    Linux

    Hoping is better than 7.10

    I do hope that the 8.04 LTS release is better than the 7.10, which is completely unstable, numerous threads and bug reports of it just locking up for no reason, with no feedback or fixes from the developers. Was really getting confident with Ubuntu and Linux before I installed 7.10, and I know I'm not the only one who's had problems with it. Should have stayed with 7.04. :(

    Hoping they put more time into testing too, so that silly little bugs like the start up screen in silly high res, doesn't happen again.

    I wish they would concentrate efforts into making a stable core system for everyone, before adding all the flashy graphics and wizzy stuff which we'll just turn off after 5 minutes anyway.

    Please just give me a rock solid OS, that I can rely on and doesn't fall over every time I try to use it. is that too much to ask?

  37. Albert

    Might encourage me to try again

    I was running 7.04 and then did the atuo-update ot 7.10.

    That was start of a long and painful time.

    Now my system is dead - bios errors from messing with it to get 7.10 running.

    With 8.04 being LTS I hope it is more stable.

    it might encourage me to strip my system down and finally get it sorted out.

    I liked 7.04. It worked very well. Did all I wanted. I would still be actively using Ubuntu if the 7.10 update didn't go so horrendously bad.

  38. The BigYin
    Flame

    Still not ready

    Ubuntu (and other Linux distros) are pretty good and offer many cool features. They seem to work pretty well (as good as Windows anyway) and will do most thing our-of-the-box. But Linux is still not ready for the masses.

    Why? Installs.

    If you have to ever edit any script or settings file by hand to get an install working, then that's a big "FAIL" in my book. And you have to do this constantly with Linux. You cannot trust the Synaptic (as they are on Ubunut) installs to work or give you the option to install where yo want, you have to get the TARs and do it all by hand. This is NEVER going to fly with the home user.

    Linux et al is good for servers, developers and the hobbyist, but it is not yet ready for Joe Public; although big strides are being made. Hopefully in a year or two we will begin to see a real competitor to Windows emerge, because it sure as heck is not going to be Apple!

  39. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    @Colin Wilson

    "gOS is not affiliated with Google or their partners."

    ... and you believe that? Sorry Colin, I don't buy it. I don't know many people who are Google fanboy-ish enough to build a new distro out of enthusiasm for the Google-brand. I don't think Google encourage sycophancy in the same way Microsoft or Apple do.

    The very fact that ThinkGoogleOSgOS-whatever based gOS on Ubuntu and that so little development has gone into it since its release makes me think that they were simply making a statement to Mark Shuttleworth.

    Shuttleworth made his first bundle building up Thawte for sale to VeriSign. He is the master of the profitable exit strategy.

    I think his instinct was to build up Ubuntu to become Gbuntu (i.e. *the* desktop Google used to wean people off Microsoft and Apple).

    Perhaps I'm underestimating him, but his background suggests that he's not the type of guy who's fired-up by altruism.

  40. John Macintyre

    @Linux = Windows, please? and others

    Perhaps linux isn't for you if you don't want anything but windows? I'd stick to windows if i were you, linux is catering for a different kind of person to you.

    for people who says it's too much hassle, I picked up mac os about a year ago and tried it for a few hours, then decided it was too complex and shelved it. Yeah fanboys scream, it wasn't windows, simple. And I had stuff to do so I didn't have the time to learn it. 6 months later i bought a mac mini and within an hour was pretty much flying around it happily due to it being so simple, but more importantly because i had the time and interest to learn it, and the understanding of the underlying system to cruise through it without manuals and help files.

    I've configured XP to run more efficiently and faster than a standard install. It's great, no major problems bar a couple of BSOD, which only happen after hibernation (i'll upgrade the drivers at some point). It's good at what it does, I won't deny that.

    If you don't want to ride the learning curve and have no interest in a different way of doing things, then don't change. I have 7.10 running of a usb key on my laptop and it's amazingly easy to use and do things with, and looks way better than both mac and windows. You can get windows emulators to handle exe installations such as wine which work fine. It also means i get an OS on a key I can use on any machine which then stores my settings (except for firefox bookmarks, still working on that one). And the UI upgrade in 7.10 was amazing compared to previous releases. I'll check out this one when it's properly released though, I'm still tweaking the current one to work the way I really want it to.

    Honestly though, I use all 3, and I don't know which I'd pick as a preference because a tweaked version of each works wonders. They all do things in certain situations that the others can't, and in my business area I need them all (IT hardware maintenance/development/testing). I've so far never had the Kubuntu fail on me, my desktop Win XP has never crashed (touch wood), my Mac has crashed back in the day but it's pretty smooth now and my laptop Win XP crashes due to hibernate (never hibernate my desktop). With a comfort level at using command lines though I find Kubuntu the smoothest to manage and maintain.

    And to 'Anon' - 'Whatever it is, I wouldn't run an OS from a company that hasn't and probably won't make a profit in the foreseeable future.'... Right.. so the fact that Win OS costs the earth and a mac hardware seem to not do 'budget' is the perfect reason to only go with a paid product? You do realise the point of Linux flavours right? We'll leave you to your overpriced extortionate OS's then...

  41. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    @John Macintyre

    "Right.. so the fact that Win OS costs the earth and a mac hardware seem to not do 'budget' is the perfect reason to only go with a paid product? You do realise the point of Linux flavours right? We'll leave you to your overpriced extortionate OS's then..."

    You've miss understood me. I'd recommend Debian because its install is very broad, its well supported and its *truly* enterprise-class with plenty of large enterprises using it in anger. As a major community distribution their business model is sound and they're not going away anytime soon.

    I don't think the same can be said for Canonical. As a conventional business I question whether they can sustain their substantial overheads indefinitely.

    If their only revenue stream is Mark Shuttleworth's bank account they won't be around for very long without going bust or selling up. Both eventualities would be disastrous for any business running Ubuntu.

  42. Andrew Taylor
    Unhappy

    Mr

    Those with a Creative sound card X-FI will be pleased to know this works with the 8.04 beta.

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