
Ubuntu 17.04 review - bigpotatoe
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2017/05/ubuntu-17-04-review-this-is-unitys-true-swan-song/
======
3pt14159
> While speed may be the single most important element of a UI, there is
> plenty about GNOME that is going to disappoint Unity users. The biggest
> gripe I have is keyboard shortcuts. Unity had them in spades. For as
> graphical as Unity is/was, it was also very easy to drive without taking
> your hands off the keyboard. GNOME lacks that level of shortcuts.

Can we please fix this before the convergence? Muscle memory and Linux go
together like rosemary and garlic.

~~~
reacweb
what are all those shortcuts ? AFAIK, you can customize gnome easily.

~~~
ralphc
Alt-` cycles through the windows within one application, such as terminal or
Chrome. Similar to what can be done on the Mac. I use it & hope Gnome can do
the same.

~~~
s_kilk
It's exactly the same in Gnome. In fact, Gnome is better in that you can
activate an extension which will change the behaviour of alt-tab so that it
cycles through all windows.

------
jamescostian
I never understood why Canonical's attempts to be "brave" (as Apple would call
it) result in Canonical pulling out, while attempts by other companies like
Apple don't.

For example, Canonical made a very brave decision to switch to Unity, and now
they're having to move away from Unity, which hints that there were enough
users against it, and they pushed Canonical into this position (along with
Canonical trying to allocate resources better).

But Apple "killed skeuomorphism" and there were tons of people complaining "MY
NOTES APP WHITE INSTEAD OF YELLOW EWWW" (especially my parents), yet today
they're still getting more users and they have so many on recent versions of
their OSes. I supported the removal of skeuomorphism, but seeing so many
around me and on the internet complain, I thought Apple would be forced to put
it back everywhere. Instead, people just moved on.

When Apple makes a "pro" laptop without any USB A ports, people laugh, but
then buy it. When Ubuntu makes a phone, Ubuntu regrets it. Why?

~~~
addicted
Apple's user base is one that wants Apple to do all their thinking for them as
far as computer decisions are concerned. Often this may lead to sub optimal
solutions for them, but they are ok with this because the overall lack of
worry with Apple products, and the fact that they have a good track record of
making good decisions, still leaves them ahead in the net (this may be
changing with pro Macs though).

Linux users, OTOH, have an opinion on everything. Worse, a vocal minority is
simply anti anything that is popular, which means Ubuntu's goals were entirely
in conflict with this segment of their base.

~~~
matt4077
Let me rephrase it in less condescending terms (or, more accurately,
/different/ condescending terms):

Apple users want to get shit done, instead of compiling custom kernels to fix
font rendering issues when using Wifi while headphones are plugged in.

"Pro user" means, for Apple, s/o using a computer to create something. It is
not someone who's a professional at using computers, i. e. constantly
optimising their 20+ USB gadgets and swapping hardware components.

~~~
atonse
Agreed here. I have compiled probably a half dozen linux kernels in the last
15 years, and especially in college, tried many flavors of linux. So I've
historically not been intimidated by tinkering.

But now that I have a career that relies on getting stuff done, and don't have
time to play with kernel modules and window managers just to get my computer
running in a stable way. I have zero patience with the clusterf*ck that seems
to still be the Linux desktop.

I mean, look at this thread itself. When I see I hear all kinds of things like
Wayland, Xwfm4, Compton, Unity, Gnome (the only one I recognize), multi
monitor issues, tearing? Who has the time these days to deal with all that,
unless it's part of their jobs, they're curious college kids, or they're
kernel hackers?

I mean, geez, it's 2017. Apple (and MS to an extent) figured these issues out
for the most part more than a decade ago. Yea yea I get it, drivers, blah
blah. But I simply don't have time anymore to futz with this stuff. I have to
get things done and need a reliable machine. And my clients don't pay me to
fiddle with my kernel to get nice animations.

It's the same reason I don't build a Hackintosh, although I'm really tempted.
SO this isn't an "I love apple" type thing – it's an "I want to get work done
and not stare at a boot loader" thing.

~~~
mangodrunk
That may be your experience, but it's not mine. I've been using Ubuntu since
2006 or so and I have never had to do the things you mentioned or had any
issues. I don't even know how to mess with kernel modules or window managers.

My experience with Apple has been far from "Getting things done". Just to name
a few issues:

* I had a screen saver (one of the stock ones) turned on and it would cause my fan to go crazy

* It still doesn't always sleep, I sometimes find it running low on battery in the morning because an application woke it up

* I have had to use the Apple store which requires a phone number, credit card, etc to just get XCode

* Maximize doesn't seem to always work

* I can't keep a window always on the top

* Changing the password for wifi sucks

* If I change my system password, for some reason I always get these annoying and constant popups saying that so-and-so wants access to something, which only works on the old password

* Copying and pasting does weird stuff, adds in a bunch of crap that I don't want often

* Updating my OS takes forever and does whatever it wants without giving me much insight into what is going on

* Unlocking my computer takes a long time

------
apatters
As someone who uses Ubuntu on both desktop and server here are my concerns
about Ubuntu and Canonical at this stage. I think Ubuntu is awesome and has
done huge things for Linux, particularly on the desktop.

A) Canonical's R&D investment is shifting from desktop components to server
components. On the one hand I'm sure the server version will get even better
which is great. But it's hard to imagine how this could translate to a win for
Ubuntu desktop users.

B) Bug #1
([https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/1](https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/1))
was closed a while back with a rationale that I thought was redefining the
truth a little bit. Canonical's new direction probably makes it even less
likely that bug #1 will ever be reopened. Again hard to see how this
translates to a win for Ubuntu desktop.

C) I know that at some point Ubuntu is moving to Wayland as well. I am
concerned that this change will break things that are important to me -- for
instance I use xmonad and it doesn't work under Wayland.

I get 100% that Canonical needs to make money, and it seems no one's ever
figured out how to do that with desktop Linux unfortunately. I just can't help
but feel we are losing the biggest champion for the Linux desktop here and am
concerned about its future.

If things get bad enough (for instance if they move to Wayland and there's
still no xmonad port) I would probably switch to Bunsen Labs or some other
form of Debian but I would miss losing the confidence Ubuntu gave me that
things would just work. Even if I do have to sign off and leave Ubuntu I will
do it with a huge /salute in their direction for having created the OS that
was good enough to enable me to make the switch to a free desktop.

I hope Canonical succeeds with their new focus. But I have a feeling an
opportunity is going to open up for someone else to become the #1 desktop
distro.

~~~
bryanlarsen
I believe that the reason that Ubuntu is winning the server market is because
it won the desktop market. Ubuntu is on most production servers because devs
are more familiar with Ubuntu than alternatives since they use Ubuntu on their
desktop. That's certainly the reason why I use Ubuntu or Debian on all the
production servers I've spun up.

I'm sure Ubuntu is well aware of this issue, and of course they're also dog-
fooding Ubuntu Desktop, so while progress may slow, I highly doubt it will
stop.

In fact it might just speed up, since for the last few years they've been
focusing their efforts on Unity 8. Now even though they'll be spending less
resources on the desktop, the resources they do spend won't be disappearing
into an unreleased project like Mir & Unity 8.

~~~
Shorel
At work I have to use CentOS. And CentOS 6 at that. The amount of old packages
is painful.

Ubuntu servers can be upgraded in place, CentOS means reinstall every time.
Also, there's a PPA for everything in Ubuntu.

Therefore for my laptop and for all personal projects, I use Ubuntu. CentOS
only brings me painful memories.

~~~
Anthony-G
You're lucky. Until very recently, I had to work on CentOS 5 which was very
frustrating. To make it more bearable, I compiled from source and installed
modern versions of non-server software for personal use, e.g., Vim, GNU
screen, Bash, etc. At home, I'm happy running Lubuntu on my laptop.

------
qznc
Canonical/Ubuntu has practically stopped innovating for the desktop. There are
a few ideas which need a big player, but nobody steps up.

1\. Copy update-in-the-background from Chrome OS/Android. If you want to
actually improve it, try to provide an undo button (which will never work 100%
though). Either use two partitions or disk snapshots for the background
system. Do the wake-up-at-night-for-update trick of Android.

2\. Turn the snap package system into a real app store. The
[https://uappexplorer.com/apps](https://uappexplorer.com/apps) is not user
friendly. There might even be money in here.

3\. Better hardware support. Hopefully they will use Nexus-of-Ubuntu idea from
the AskHN thread. [http://blog.dustinkirkland.com/2017/04/thank-you-note-to-
hac...](http://blog.dustinkirkland.com/2017/04/thank-you-note-to-
hackernews.html)

~~~
educar
Linux users will not pay for appstore. There is no money to be made here. Just
another timesink. You need to first attract significant non-developer users to
Ubuntu (which is tied to making better laptops).

~~~
Shorel
Yep, there was already a pay store with Ubuntu One. Bought some games there.

~~~
qznc
Nobody said it would be easy. On the other hand, there is Steam, which is an
app store on Ubuntu.

The Ubuntu One store had technical issues and Snap solves at least a few of
those if not all. For example, "works only on Ubuntu!" or "what about my
dependencies?". It would be hilarious if Redhat users would buy their
proprietary software from Canonical.

Still, the main challenge of an app store is not the technical side, but the
business stuff: Get a critical mass of apps. It is also the reason why only
Canonical or Red Hat could pull this off. It would be quite the hustle. Even
Steve Jobs had some fights for the Apple App Store.

Some ideas to put there: Sublime Text, Gitlab EE, CLion, PyCharm, Zend Studio,
Gurobi, Spotify, Netflix, TeamViewer, Matlab, Mathematica, SPSS, Stata, Maya,
VMWare, Crossover Wine, Guitar Pro, Bricscad, Houdini, etc.

Another problem is the barrier of entry. How to get the customers to open an
account? Once the account is open, buying stuff is one click and the 1$ apps
will be bought on impulse. Cooperate with Humble Bundle and others for
exclusive sales. The usual PR drill.

There are opportunities like App Store for Business. Where the company buys
the IDE for all its employees via the app store and handles all the licencing
there.

------
evand
This is a quick intro if you want to learn more about the mentioned snap
package format:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLxqdf89hRo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLxqdf89hRo)

The article somewhat erroneously equates snaps and flatpaks. While flatpak
focuses on GNOME, snaps are more broadly geared to any Linux software needing
transactional updates (databases, Electron apps, docker/k8s, etc).

~~~
fleg
> flatpak focuses on GNOME

It is developed by people involved in Gnome, but it's desktop-independent.
[http://flatpak.org/faq.html#Is_Flatpak_tied_to_GNOME_](http://flatpak.org/faq.html#Is_Flatpak_tied_to_GNOME_)

~~~
digi_owl
These days it is damn hard to tell where Gnome ends and Freedesktop, never
mind Fedora, begins.

All too often it feels like Gnome and Freedesktop is out to fix "problems"
that only exist within Fedora, in the process turning every other distro they
touch into a Fedora clone.

------
lotsoflumens
I predict a resurgence of interest in KDE.

... despite the numerous Plasma crashes lately.

~~~
holtalanm
I used KDE until they released that godawful Plasma desktop.

Don't get me wrong, it looks absolutely BEAUTIFUL, but it crashes constantly,
and it is a crapshoot on whether or not it will actually even BOOT within a
virtual machine.

~~~
yoodenvranx
I use KDE Neon as my daily driver and I did not have a single crash in the
last 4-5 months. I _love_ Plasma 5.9!

~~~
im_down_w_otp
I will attest to the same. My whole Engineering team is going to be migrating
to KDE Neon as the primary development environment. Several of us have been
trialing it for months, and as far as Linux goes it's been fantastic.

------
pdog
If you want to get a head start on the future of Ubuntu, check out Ubuntu
GNOME[1]. It's an official distribution of Ubuntu and where it's heading.

[1]: [https://ubuntugnome.org/](https://ubuntugnome.org/)

~~~
reacweb
already using ubuntu gnome since 2013 because I did not like unity. I am so
glad this is becoming the main flavour of ubuntu.

If I have well understood, any new installation of ubuntu should use ubuntu
gnome in order to be future proof. Or am I missing something ?

~~~
holtalanm
or you could use almost any other flavor of ubuntu, since it is highly
doubtful they will be going anywhere any time soon.

I personally prefer Lubuntu, or LXDE installed over Unity.

~~~
StavrosK
Are there any problems if you install LXDE/XFCE on a normal Ubuntu
installation?

~~~
holtalanm
I cant speak for XFCE, but LDXE installed flawlessly on a normal Ubuntu
installation.

~~~
StavrosK
Thank you. I tried it too, and it installed great, but in the process of
tweaking one of the two, I changed some setting for appearance and now Unity
has a weird theme.

I think I liked LXDE more than XFCE, though. I will play with them some more
and see, thank you.

------
mixmastamyk
Too bad he talks about unity for half the article, which I never liked much
and rarely used. It had a lot of promise but snatched defeat from the jaws of
victory. Didn't support the windows key or hot corner for opening the menu. Oh
and hid menus by default.

More generally I'm not a fan of the war on menus across desktops, which are
useful as a table of contents. Let them and title bars take less room on
widescreen monitors, but don't cripple them.

Using MATE on 4k screens and happy. Still can't give up the clock/calendar
with day/night map and timezones from gnome2. Could someone port that
forward?, it's awesome. Advanced menu supports win key and type to filter.

He mentions the kernel with one sentence about kaby lake support, which was
helpful to know, just got a new laptop. How are systemd and wayland coming
along? Any other improvements under the hood?

Was very happy Python 3.6 was made easily available, when will it be the
default 3.x? Cheers.

------
vfclists
What is happening with Ubuntu is what happens when the top executives realize
that it may be more profitable to mothball their companies' developments and
sellout to the main competition rather than compete with them.

With Canonical and Redhat virtually in bed with Microsoft does any one
seriously think that Canonical was going to proceed on a path that would mean
getting into head on competition with a major company they had decided to
collaborate with?

When Ubuntu collaborates with Microsoft on Bash/WSL what do you think is going
to happen? When hardware vendors don't want to open up their drivers for Linux
to compete effectively with Windows and Mac how much progress can Ubuntu make
with their phones?

The Linux desktop is supposed to be a power users desktop but their poor
vision of its developers failed it. It is supposed to be the equivalent of an
advanced Smalltalk or Lisp workstation where its administration is concerned,
to managed by messaging passing scripting languages like Smalltalk, Lisp or
similar. The fact that it is still managed by tedious error prone scripts and
configuration files only shows how poor the whole design has been. Coming to
think of Linux is just the kernel, and none of the desktop developers had the
smarts to develop a sound administration language and build the desktop proper
on top of it. All that has happened is that it has given Microsoft and the
other big guys the breathing space to retrench and now they have carved up the
market by basically co-opting Redhat and Canonical into their camp.

Frankly Canonical has no future, and you can expect it to be absorbed by
Redhat at some point in the future given that Redhat controls the Debian
project which is the foundation on which Ubuntu itself is built. The only
reason why Microsoft would not absorb Canonical itself is to give the
impression of competition.

So in effect Ubuntu has turned into the goto desktop for Linux administrators,
while Microsoft deepens and extends its reach by making Windows the goto tool
for developing cross platform applications.

------
holtalanm
I really hope they fix GNOME on VirtualBox before the convergence. Currently,
it will not run at all with 3D Acceleration.

It is why I have been using Unity, seeing as it works with 3D Acceleration
flawlessly on VirtualBox.

~~~
digi_owl
Another reason to distrust compositing without a fallback route for "low
power" environments...

------
Shorel
Minwaita fixes the huge title bars.

------
chops
I imagine Unity will live on in some way with a Ubuntu flavor called Uubuntu.

------
xur17
I am curious to see how gnome handles hidpi. In the past gnome would only
accept integer values for dpi, while Unity allows floats (ex: 1.5), which is a
deal breaker for me.

~~~
airfluyt
Gnome on 17.04 allows floats.

------
hacksonx
I might start using Ubuntu pure again. I honestly never understood the switch
to this interface on desktop. Microsoft tried it on Windows 8 and failed.

~~~
Jedd
Please to be defining 'failed'.

~~~
nobleach
Not the OP but I think hacksonx might be referring to the big squares UI. They
designed an interface that one could use with their feet... elbows.... etc...
And it had that Pinterest/Masonry appeal to it. I think they realized quickly
that that's not how desktop users interacted with their computer. Was it a
failure? I can't say I've met anyone that is trying to re-enable that
interface on any other device. I do know they went back to using a more
Window95-esque interface for the default Windows 10 desktop.

~~~
Jedd
Sure. It was an interesting experiment (and certainly not one that I enjoyed
-- I'm on Win7 Pro on the few VM's that I have to run MS on).

My point was that MS hasn't suffered massive _failure_ despite this ludicrous
attempt at promulgating a feet/elbows interface on devices with actual
keyboards and mouses.

Yes, lots of people (especially relatively technically aware people that I
know) have resisted the upgrade to MS Windows 8 / 10 -- but they're still
running Microsoft Windows.

Compare and contrast the Canonical Unity experiment.

------
c8g
‎[https://youtube.com/watch?v=qqPQggW1vMA](https://youtube.com/watch?v=qqPQggW1vMA)

