Ubuntu 10.04: Five Changes You May Not Have Noticed
Lest they slip by unnoticed, here's a look at some less conspicuous--but not insignificant--changes to expect in Lucid.
Fewer Games
When it debuts in a few weeks, Ubuntu 10.04 will bring some major changes in the form of a new theme, changes to window titlebars and the advent of the Ubuntu One Music Store. But that’s not all that’s new.
Lest they slip by unnoticed, here’s a look at some less conspicuous–but not insignificant–changes to expect in Lucid.
Fewer Games
I can’t say I know anyone who became an Ubuntu user because of its games. All the same, if you’re a fan of titles like Nibbles or GNU Chess, you’ll have to install them yourself in Lucid, since the suite of GNOME games shipped by default has been substantially reduced. Ubuntu 10.04 comes with only five games, down from about a dozen in previous releases.
On the other hand, a new game, gbrainy, has been added.
Yahoo! search by default
In January, Canonical announced that the default search engine in Firefox on new Lucid systems would be Yahoo! Fortunately, those of us who resent the abuse of punctuation can restore the previous default, Google, with a few clicks.
Personally, I’d started to forget Yahoo! existed. Thanks to Canonical for reminding me.
Goodbye, GIMP!
In a move that received slightly more publicity than the other changes outlined in this post, Canonical decided to remove the GIMP image editor from the application stack in Lucid, with the logic that other programs provide the minimal image-manipulation functionality required by average users.
That means it’s time to get to know F-Spot for your redeye-removal needs.
Gwibber
As of Lucid, the microblogging client Gwibber comes bundled with Ubuntu. It supports a number of protocols, including but not limited to Twitter and Facebook, allowing users to read and post status messages from one centralized desktop location. The social networkers in the audience should be well pleased.
Simple Scan for scanning
For as long as I can remember, Ubuntu came with XSane installed for scanning documents. While XSane was a solid application, its interface screamed “1999!” as loudly as that of its website.
Lucid introduces Simple Scan, an application built on the same backend as XSane, but with a much prettier and more familiar GTK+ interface. Users can now scan documents without feeling like they’re using some arcane version of Red Hat.
All in all, I’m impressed by the number of changes Canonical decided to make for Lucid, given that it’s an LTS release–for which Ubuntu developers have traditionally focused on delivering maximum stability, with minimal novelty.
That said, none of the changes discussed here are very major, and as long as Lucid performs as well as its name sounds, I’ll be pleased (bonus points if this bug magically gets fixed before the 29th).
I think most of the changes are good. It requires good balance to way between adding the newest and shiniest and providing stability from the get-go. It’s not only an LTS, it’s also a normal 6-month release like any other, so you have to give the bleeding-edgers something to be enthusiastic about as well.
As far as I know, the issue with the titlebar buttons is still open. It should be decided in time for Beta 2. Though I was a loud opponent of the change in the beginning, I don’t feel quite as strongly for it now. Being able to use free space in the menubar as you would use the titlebar, is a very good idea. But it’s way too early, since it only works for GTK-applications, currently. This means that you can drag GNOME applications with the menubar, but not Firefox or OpenOffice.org, for instance. This leads to a much less consistent user interface, which is a bad thing. Therefore I think that, while the ideas themselves are exciting, this is not the time to implement them. Unless, at least, they can make it work perfectly for all applications so that users doesn’t have to understand the difference between different toolkits, like GTK and Qt.
But I like the set of features. One question that I keep asking myself, is whether it’s still reasonable to make the graphical installer a CD image instead of DVD. We have better alternatives for lower end computers, that cannot boot from a DVD, and we could really need the extra space. Yes, we have a DVD image, but the default software stack remains the same.
In any case, I’m really looking forward to the release.
Thank God for replacing XSane! But GIMP 🙁
We’re losing GIMP?! 🙁
Don’t forget PiTiVi 🙂
GIMP isn’t going anywhere…it’s just not installed by default any longer. Just do a “sudo apt-get install gimp” and it’s there.
At last look there are 487 games in universe for Ubuntu.
Gimp will not be installed by default you can install it yourself in Ubuntu software center.
JP and Steve: right, GIMP can still be installed from the repositories, as can all the GNOME games and XSane. But they will no longer be installed by default, which is significant for some people (like those without broadband Internet access).
I like the idea of Ubuntu coming with less!! I would like a nice stripped version and I could my own programs. I mean that is what many of us do anyway I think.
Anyway I am going to stick with 9.10 anyway until they fix the sound issues…I can tell you that is keeping a lot of microsoft users away!
I also like the app changes. Even gimp – I’m a fan of gimp, the rare time I need it – but for many users it’s way overkill.
Gwibber on the desktop is nice too!
[…] Ubuntu 10.04: Five Changes You May Not Have Noticed All in all, I’m impressed by the number of changes Canonical decided to make for Lucid, given that it’s an LTS release–for which Ubuntu developers have traditionally focused on delivering maximum stability, with minimal novelty. […]
Christopher: Come on…I hardly call having to download GIMP *one* time “significant” for users without broadband. Users without broadband will have to suffer the pains of a slow internet regardless of whether or not they want GIMP, e.g. updates, browsing the web, using Ubuntu One, the Music Store, etc. I’m also surprised you didn’t mention the addition of PiTiVi for video editing.
Yahoo now only exists as a proxy for Bing. I’ll definitely be changing the default back to Google. Fspot will also be ditched and Gimp will be restored to it’s rightful place on my hard drive.
Gbrainy will be ditched as a matter of protest. Canonical ditched the Gimp claiming they needed to save space on the CD then turn around and rely on Mono bloated apps.
I’m in two minds about Ubuntu at the moment. It works well for me. But I switched to Ubuntu to get away from Microsoft. So introducing stuff that relies on Microsoft technology makes me very uneasy. I might switch to Fedora. Which will be a whole new learning curve.
Um … am I the only one who’s noticed that the GIMP is on the “Featured Applications” list in 10.04 Beta 1? It’s not like they’re kicking it to the curb, just trying to determine what the best starter set for the average desktop user is (assuming you’ve only got 700 MB of space …)
And about the games, the ones that have been omitted always seemed more like GNOME demos than actual games to me.
What I want to know is why Canonical is so hell bent on keeping each Ubuntu release limited to a CD (700MB). For the last 5 years or so you can not even buy a computer with a CD drive, they all have DVD drives, and also with Terabyte dives surely it is better to have choice at what to install at install time than having to download individual packages etc later.
Logical changes, all in all.
The Gimp is still one click away. Nevertheless, I don’t think F-Spot is the solution, as a lot of people will get rid of Mono in the very fist place after installation. And, like every Mono applications, F-Spot is sooo slow it’s really annoying. I would recommend shotwell for simple manipulations like red eyes. But, as of right now, you have to search for it on the web and add the repository, which is sad.
Simple scan is a great addition, but it seems to me it’s still a bit experimental and won’t recognize every scanners or multifunctions printers, I think.
Gwibber is excellent in the prospect of social interactions and the MeMenu just great. I think Canonical has made some good choices in the last year (UO amp; UOMS, Gwibber, MeMenu) regarding social and cloud matters, anticipating how the user experience will evolve, with a clear medium-term view, which is not so obvious in other distributions.
I use GiMP pretty often, but for people who need a simple paint app, try Pinta: pinta-project.com (its depended on Mono).
Vinnie1: Ubuntu is already very bloated compared to other distros. I think 700mb is fine. Linux offers freedom and choices. In poorer part of the world, not everyone have a DVD player. Also I have slow internet, so it takes a long time to download 700mb. You notice they provide different versions: Desktop, Alternative, Server, Netbook.
The best thing to do is provide a minimal version like Debian (something less than 300mb), then a CD version, lastly a DVD with all the languages and other packages. This is mainly how Debian does it.
Besides it doesn’t make sense to add a bunch of apps not polished and integrated into the distro, that could introduce more bug and extra support requirements. You can do that yourself with a tool like Ubuntu Customization KIt, which will let you delete and add packages to the Ubuntu iso. You can add proprietary packages too if you want.
I don’t buy saving space on the disc as being a valid reason for pulling high quality and popular applications from the default software stack. There are a myriad of options open to Canonical if space on the disc is really that big an issue.
Personally I’m not happy about the increasing dependence on Mono. It simply gives me an uncomfortableness about the future direction of Ubuntu and Canonical. And I’m not entirely sure Canonical have been honest with the community as to why popular applications like the Gimp are being pulled.
If the Gimp is really that hard to use for basic things like red eye removal, why not write a script for the Gimp instead of a whole new application? The Gimp has extensive support for scripting!
Canonical are often accused of taking from the community and not giving back. Contributing to the Gimp project would have been an ideal opportunity to give something back. Instead Canonical has bizarrely decided to compete with the Gimp. Why is it doing that?
aikiwolfie: I kinda understand where you are coming from about the gimp to a point. I use gimp but I think we have to be honest for your basic around the house redeye removal etc its just not good for that for normal users. Personally I use Picasa for it.
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Soy usuario de Arch Linux,Gentoo y de Ubuntu y me sorprende lo bien que desempeña Ubuntu 10.04, si lo comparamos con la 9.10 se arreglaron muchos bugs…ahora mi sistema corre de la ptm…un menor consumo de recursos, una velocidad de encendido y apagado superior, el consumo de energía tambien a disminuido, estilo visual muy agradable…esto me alegra ya que el marrón le daba un feo aspecto…pero con el nuevo se aprecia una buena mejoría…el cambio de gimp le veo un error por parte de los desarrolladores…es muy util…pero no nos preocupemos…aun esta en los repositorios…pitivi como editor de vifeo..tenia que haber uno ps sino donde esta Ubuntu…uso de empathy muy util para ver tu correo aunque yo uso el emesene por mayor comodidad…y además de contar con Firefox un excelente navegador…y con sus complemento la haces XD…codecs de audio, video, flash, java y otros…todos eso se instala con un solo paquete el llamado Extras Restricted Ubuntu (Extras Restringidos de Ubuntu) con eso instalado ya no tendras problema con la reproduccion de tus vídeos y tambien podras ver los videos de youtube…para videos en Full HD 1920×1080 sólo en este caso uno el VLC ya que en Totem empieza a saltar los fotogramas…y ahora Wine que con la ultima version ya puedo instalar la mayoria de juegos, los que tengo instado por ahora son Counter Strike, Warcraft+Expansión+Dota…si ps para jugarles vía online a mis amigos…como siempre dotero XD…me sorprende que hallan arreglado la integridad del gnome con el compiz…hasta hora no he tenido problemas…como tengo una tarjeta gráfica NVIDIA uso el Software privativo…cosa que en Ubuntu con unos cuantos click ya se empieza a instalar,y tambien tenemos el Simple Scan…comparandola con XSane este es más simple pero con el mismo rendimiento…aunque prefiero el XSane ya que permite configurar el escaneo aún más…sin más que decir Ubunru superó mis espectativas…y esperando ahora Ubuntu 10.10 Maverick Meerkat XD
Why not just make it so it can be installed from the website.