back to article Ubuntu 12.10: More to Um Bongo Linux than Amazon ads

A second beta of Ubuntu 12.10 has arrived and its biggest feature has proved its most controversial: the integration of Amazon.com search results on your desktop. A new Lens in the Unity Dash will poll Amazon to find results relevant to your search terms. And yes, if you click the link and buy the item Ubuntu-maker Canonical …

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  1. Alan Bourke

    I have gone to Mint KDE

    and I'm increasingly glad.

    1. Stuart 22

      Re: I have gone to Mint KDE

      Hopefully Kubuntu will remain a Amazon free zone.

      Am I alone in thinking the unity desktop looks aweful with or without Amazon.

      1. xperroni
        WTF?

        Re: Fedora here (was: I have gone to Mint KDE)

        Am I alone in thinking the unity desktop looks aweful with or without Amazon.

        Same thing here. Ever since they instated Unity I have considered giving Ubuntu another chance, but in the end I can't stand the fluffiness of the UI – to say nothing of the increasingly dumb(ifying) feature decisions.

        Looks like I'll settle down with Fedora for a long time...

      2. Tom 38
        Headmaster

        Re: I have gone to Mint KDE

        Am I alone in thinking the unity desktop looks aweful with or without Amazon.

        Do you mean "appalling; terrible" or "inspiring awe; profoundly impressive"?

        1. Fibbles
          Facepalm

          Re: I have gone to Mint KDE

          Do you mean "appalling; terrible" or "inspiring awe; profoundly impressive"?

          The one that isn't archaic. If he was talking about inspiring awe he'd use awesome.

          You grammar Nazis really need to get a life.

      3. Fatman

        Re: Am I alone in thinking the unity desktop looks aweful

        NO!!!!!

        On both of my machines, that clusterfuck called Unity has been scraped from the hard drive.

        UI for a smartphone or tablet - maybe, but for a desktop - absolutely not!!

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Thumb Up

      Mint KDE

      Me too

      I just got as far as "a new Lens in Unity" and stopped reading.

    3. SilverWave
      Go

      I went xubuntu - Fantastic it all just works.

      Easy as an easy thing.

      http://complete-concrete-concise.com/ubuntu-2/ubuntu-12-04/ubuntu-12-04-how-to-install-the-xfce-desktop

      Note: I did give Unity a fair hearing - 2-3 years? But Once you try Xfce you are back with a proper, useful, dare I say _delightful_, desktop.

      Its the difference between night and day.

      1. Stuart 22
        Thumb Up

        Re: I went xubuntu - Fantastic it all just works.

        I use Kubuntu but while I like KDE - version 4 suffers from severe bloat.

        I also have a few Raspberrypies. At first LXDE was so slow as to be a joke. With the latest Debian release it does perform adequately and I've been playing around with the Midori browser. Going back to basics is quite enlightening. Because it doesn't understand Flash etc it automatically strips much of the bloat in many websites so the end to end performance is not that far short of a 'proper PC'.

        Perhaps it is a bit too basic. Xbuntu may be a middle way. I may give it a go ...

        1. Michael Dunn

          Re: I went xubuntu - Fantastic it all just works.

          "I also have a few Raspberrypies." You lucky person! I still haven't got the one I ordered in June.

  2. JDX Gold badge

    You'd think tech-savvy Linux users wouldn't be confused into thinking this was a privacy issue, since the overlords made it pretty clear they do the search and pass on the results. What was the comment... "you don't trust US? We have root already, you implicitly trust us"

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "you don't trust US? We have root already, you implicitly trust us"

      I like the use of grammatical tense there, to imply that trust is current and continuing. Cos, y'know, they've already demonstrated that they're happy to observe your searches and pass them on to third parties and crap adverts into your desktop and then follow up with what looks remarkably like a thinly veiled threat regarding the fact that they could do whatever the hell they liked, if they wanted to.

      So that's nice.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Thumb Up

      but "tech-savvy Linux users"

      won't be using this kak

    3. Tom 38
      Trollface

      Oxymoron

      "Tech savvy Linux users" and "Ubuntu".

  3. Avatar of They
    WTF?

    wtf?

    I can't say I am against web apps as I use drop box and Android. But my desktop is a desktop, not a mobile device. I don't need to run web apps on a desktop, I use a desktop app for desktop stuff and it is called a program and there are a few that I use that a installed locally. I don't want to run my personal word docs and personal finances by what ubuntu think I should be doing, or google or MS. I run software to store locally and I DECIDE what goes onto the web as storage or sharing.

    Having things stuck on as web apps as default is a slippery slope. Yes I shop at amazon, yes I quite like amazon, but I don't want everything I do to search via amazon. Am I to believe next time I look on urban dictionary to find out what a particular word is, that Amazon and ubuntu are both going to try and sell me something related? It will lead to very awkward searches and really dodgy results. :)

    Unity was one step too far for me with ubuntu, but enforced web apps, searches with an amazon app built in. Taking the p*ss now Mr Shuttleworth.

    I agree Linux to progress might need support, and money making with advertising is a possible revenue stream. Doesn't mean people want it though.

    1. Yet Another Anonymous coward Silver badge

      Re: wtf?

      You might be interested in a new prouct me and some friends at IBM are working on.

      It's a small cheap standalone computer that can operate without a connection to a corporate mainframe, but just sit on your desk, and do your work, when you need it, rather than just be a terminal.

      We are thinking of calling it personal computer.

    2. Fibbles

      Re: wtf?

      WTF is this nonsense about web apps anyway? From what I can tell reading on various *buntu forums and such, the Amazon web app is identical in functionality to a bookmark that links to a web page.

      It's almost as if the people at Canonical don't remember the 90s. Active Desktop anyone?

      1. FatGerman
        Windows

        Re: wtf?

        "It's almost as if the people at Canonical don't remember the 90s. Active Desktop anyone?"

        I don't think any of the script kiddies responsible for this rubbish were even born in the '90s.

  4. batfastad

    Ubuntu

    This kind of integrate everything into everything into everything actually put me off Ubuntu a couple of years ago. IIRC there was some sort of social media garbage that they pre-installed and I could tell this was a destination they would head down.

    Just give me a base shell/desktop and I will install the exact packages that I want. Just make sure the package manager can resolve the dependencies properly.

  5. squilookle
    Go

    On the one hand, I don't think the Amazon results are necessary - I have a perfectly good web browser and would not like to see resources wasted on duplicating it's functionality in the dash.

    On the other hand, I don't mind Canonical getting some money back somehow.

    Generally, I'm not outraged by the Amazon thing but I give it a cold welcome. Canonical have made several decisions with regards to the direction of Ubuntu that did not make sense at the time, but have come to make sense in later releases - e.g. the Global menu bar didn't make sense until HUD. So, I look forward to seeing where they go with this in the end.

    1. I Am Spartacus
      Pirate

      I agree

      If you shop on Amazon then this saves a couple of key clicks if you don't have a browser open. Like that's going to happen.

      What upsets me is that I get Ubuntu from a UK distributor. It's a UK based development team. I am in the UK. ... .... I want this to go to Amazon.co.uk

      1. squilookle
        Unhappy

        Re: I agree

        Another advantage of doing this in the browser - you know where it's going and, of course, have control over it. If it gets the results from anywhere other than amazon.co.uk then I'm definitely not interested.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: I agree

        I'd also like to see Amazon pay their fair share of UK Tax

  6. Herbert Fruchtl
    FAIL

    Lost for words

    My desktop is mine! I can see the point of mixing of local apps, a quick link to an installer, and online apps, as long as I am asked if I want it. But mixing paid-for advertising with a local desktop search is such a hare-brained rip-off idea that the members of the Axis of Evil (MS and Google) would not have tried to tread there. This is as bad as Smart Tags and worse than the fact that Google thinks nothing of searching my email, FFS. Even if they retract it now, it shows a mindset that makes me add Canonical to the companies to avoid if possible. In contrast to MS and Google, this one can be completely avoided.

  7. b166er

    Apps yes, OSes no

    It's the desktop which has the ads. ie: another application.

    An application Microsoft is taking great steps to hide in it's new OS.

    So the desktop is simply another app.

    There are ads in XBox Live's dashboard too, but overall, I like XBox Live's dashboard.

    I like the look of Modern UI too, and I'm sure there may well be the odd ad that crops up there too.

    Hell this website has skyscraper ads and it doesn't stop me coming here.

    Ads are a fact of life really, you've just got to improve your filter-foo. It's rare I notice and advert I'm not in some way interested in, so if I only notice ads I'm somewhat interested in, what's the problem. It doesn't make me more likely to buy that product, no matter what marketing surveys might say.

    Some of my favourite telly (ITV) from the 80s, were the adverts (that's no saying much, granted, where ITV are concerned)

    Perhaps Canonical will offer a paid for, ad free version. It's fair they make money after all?!?

    This turned into a bit of a rant didn't it? Sorry *)

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Apps yes, OSes no

      Agreed about adverts being some of the best telly. I especially liked the Neutralia advert from the mid nineties.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Apps yes, OSes no

        Agreed about adverts being some of the best telly.

        When I lived in Europe in the eighties, one of the highlights of a trip to the UK was the telly adverts.

      2. Ian Johnston Silver badge

        Re: Apps yes, OSes no

        Was the Neutralia advert the one with the nipple?

    2. Nigel 11
      Thumb Down

      Re: Apps yes, OSes no

      Perhaps Canonical will offer a paid for, ad free version. It's fair they make money after all?!?

      Closed source thinking.

      With open source, the source is public and someone will take the source of your no-ads version and rebuild it and put it up for download. You are not allowed to withhold that source from them, if it's a derivative program of a GPL'ed work. If you've tried to protect yourself by (say) copyrighting the artwork, it'll just take them a little longer to replace that with their own. Red Hat do copyright theit graphics, probably more because of Oracle than the free distributions. If Centos slipped up, I very much doubt Red Hat would do any more than bang off an e-mail telling them which copyrighted graphic they missed.

      Red Hat understands this. AFAIK they are happy with it, but if they are unhappy it'll do them no good at all. So they actively encourage people who aren't willing to pay to use Fedora, which is a sort of years-long much-better-than-beta test. It also gives them a chance to garner feedback on radical re-designs before they inflict them on paying customers!

      And if you aren't happy to live close to the bleeding edge, there's Centos (bug-for-bug compatible with RHEL) and Scientific Linux (very slighly less bug-for-bug, in that they fix any bug that's causing problems at CERN, even if Red Hat don't).

      And of course, there are several Debian-flavour distributions that aren't Ubuntu. And of course, you have very great freedom to remove any packages that offend you, and install replacements that don't.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      @b166er - Re: Apps yes, OSes no

      This website has skyscraper ads but it is us that we're coming here by our own will, not the website coming at us wanted or not. To me it is a great difference.

  8. Ken Hagan Gold badge

    Is the love mutual?

    Does Amazon's downloader now come in 64-bit flavour or do I still have to fire up a 32-bit system to buy their MP3s?

    (Oh, and that *is* a rather good bug report. The comments thread took a few posts to get going but got there in the end.)

    1. JDX Gold badge

      Re: Is the love mutual?

      You mean your OS can't run 32 bit apps in 64-bit mode? That's pretty tragic.

    2. Martin
      Go

      Re: Is the love mutual?

      Don't touch the Amazon mp3 downloader. Use Pymazon instead. Much neater.

    3. Ian Johnston Silver badge
      Thumb Down

      Re: Is the love mutual?

      The Amazon MP3 downloader for Linux has been withdrawn altogether, regardless of number of bits.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Queue the freetards....

    ....complaining that their 'rights' are being compromised. If you're too cheap to pay for a proper commercial operating system like Windows 8, then you have no right to moan about it.

    1. Alan Bourke
      Pint

      Re: Queue the freetards....

      Lame troll of the month award!

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Headmaster

      Re: Queue the freetards....

      It's cue, not queue.

      1. Midnight

        Re: Queue the freetards....

        Maybe they were all lining up to have their say.

        They're very polite that way.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Thumb Down

      Re: Queue the freetards....

      "....complaining that their 'rights' are being compromised. If you're too cheap to pay for a proper commercial operating system like Windows 8, then you have no right to moan about it."

      Or use one of the other completely free Linux distributions or OSes that don't invade your privacy. But if you insist on spending money, follow the troll and buy Windows 8.

    4. 45RPM Silver badge
      Flame

      Re: Queue the freetards....

      A haha haha haha ha! WIndows 8, a proper Operating System? Not just Windows, a proper Operating System? Windows 8? Really? Are you a Microsoft shill or just a kiddie who has only ever seen one operating system, and that on his Mummy's PC, purchased from Comet with Tesco vouchers?

    5. foo_bar_baz
      Pint

      Re: Queue the freetards....

      The freetards must NOT stand in a row! They must NOT lollygag all over the place! It is time to take a stand on freetards!

      Queue them! Queue them I say! Queue them with middleware, queue them with enterprise busses! Queue them to parallel threads and with multiprocessing modules! We shall queue them on the beaches and landing grounds. We shall queue them with growing confidence in the air! We shall never surrender!

      OK, it's Friday and I need a pint. Maybe a little lie down.

      1. foo_bar_baz
        Facepalm

        Re: Friday

        Except it's Tuesday. I think I just need my meds.

        1. Fibbles

          Re: Friday

          "OK, it's Friday and I need a pint."

          "Except it's Tuesday. I think I just need my meds."

          You raised my hopes and dashed them quite expertly, sir. Bravo! - Tinny Tim

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Pint

        "OK, it's Friday and I need a"

        calendar?

        cheers

    6. Fatman

      Re: Queue the freetards....then you have no right to moan about it.

      All I have to say is this:

      Shut

      The

      Fuck

      Up!!!

      You can take your beloved WindblowZE operating system, and stick that bloated mess where the sun will never shine!

  10. Mystic Megabyte
    Coffee/keyboard

    From the bug report

    >> "People who searched for this regexp also searched for"

    LOL

  11. Richard Wharram
    Thumb Up

    Web apps on desktop

    Like what Peppermint has been doing for two years?

    On the flip side I installed this the other day on my Thinkpad T400 and it's really nice.

    Very fast in operation. The Unity interface is fine for it's main usage as a family machine. I can always install a different desktop if I want to use it for more serious stuff.

    The wife will probably love the Amazon integration. My credit card will be less impressed :(

  12. Mage Silver badge
    Linux

    Ubuntu?

    You are history here. The latest in a long line of fails. Just as OS X is morphing ot iOS and Walled Gardens, Microsoft shoots their own feet off at the waist, with just about everything they have released, Canonical snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

    All they had to do was have what they had two years ago, but faster, smoother, more consistent and fewer bugs. Instead they stick joss sticks up their nose and ear buds with loud whale song and go La La La.... IDIOTS

    Debian 4 months ago, we shut down our last MS (Windows 2000) Server. .

    So YET AGAIN, for about the 30th year running this won't be the year UNIX, BSD, Xenix, Cromix, Linux etc becomes successful on the desktop.

    I guess most people need to stick with XP, or maybe Windows 7. I'll stagger on with a mix of XP (one ten year old laptop) and Debian (all the other Laptops, server etc).

    Using various *nx since 1985. It would make a grown Penguin cry.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Ubuntu?

      "...because the only way to learn what's not perfect is to have other people - real people - use it."

      Just take a look at the hits recorded by Distrowatch, Ubuntu is on the downward path because people DON'T use it as much as they did.

      Canonical, give the people what they want, not what you think they want, otherwise no one will use what you are providing.

      1. EGW
        Mushroom

        Re: Ubuntu?

        Where is your logic. In the first place commenting about Distrowatch as if it really meant something. Get real and stop trying to incite the less learned in this comments section. In the first place the Distrowatch hit parade means nothing and you should know this has much as you've been there and guess what, the people who go there are in the minority. And all the stupid threats from all the freeloaders here, Boo Hoo, I'll go to another distro, Boo Hoo, Canonical won't do what I want them to do, Boo Hoo Hoo!!! Why did you people even come to read a review on Ubuntu. You don't know anything about it? You need another shoulder to cry on? You people give open source and Linux a bad name. I try to tell people how open and free thinking the open source world is and then they hear this crap from these people who act like everybody owes them something and how they think they know what's good for everyone. You people need to grow up and stop acting like spoit brats. There's so many good things you could be doing why do you want to drag down the name of LInux and at the same make yourself look so childish. Get a grip children.

    2. Nigel 11
      Unhappy

      Re: Ubuntu?

      If all we need is a distribution that boots direct into Gnome 2 for that much-like-XP experience, then it already exists, and Linux will conquer (not the Ubuntu flavour, though).

      The block is Microsoft data-format lock-in. Openoffice and LibreOffice are not entirely compatible with MS Office, and the (slight!) incompatibilities are the reason that businesses continue to fork out several hundred quid per employee on MS office licenses, than loading one of the free Office softwares onto their Microsoft systems and then planning an exodus to Linux.

      It's not just Office, of course. Outlook is another lock-in. Ever tried using Thunderbird as a mail client in an organisation that uses Outlook calendar functions? Then there are Access databases. And of course, all the proprietary Microsoft-only applications that they've bought from third-party vendors.

      Truth be told, LInux lost the corporate desktop before Linux was born. The only business that can easily migrate to Linux for everything, is one that has yet to buy its first computers. And the trouble is that start-up businesses usually don't have anyone who knows about Linux and about the Microsoft data-format lock-in trap. By the time they are big enough to have even a part-time computer system manager, Microsoft will rule their roost.

      The unhappy face should be crying. The business model that Microsoft uses is very similar to that of a Cocaine cartel (albeit legal). By the time the user realizes Cocaine (or MS software) is not his friend, it's too late for most users to do anything about it.

    3. keithpeter Silver badge
      Boffin

      Re: Ubuntu?

      "I'll stagger on with a mix of XP (one ten year old laptop) and Debian (all the other Laptops, server etc)."

      What I can't understand is people changing their distribution because of the desktop/window manager. Desktop/window managers are just programs, there are plenty more of those in the repositories.

      Just pop IceWm on Ubuntu 12.04 (and add the icewm-themes package, thunar, some icons for thunar and add the Radience theme of box-look.org). Pig fast and I love that tiling thing icewm does.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: people changing their distribution

        Yes that's true. I use 11.04 with Gnome 2, and my 12.04 "testing" system Ubuntu Studio, which comes with XFCE but I'm running MATE. Not a Unity lens in sight!

        Mind you, the change from Ubuntu to Mint is not much more than a change of, err, flavour. If MATE doesn't work out with 12.04, that's what I'll do.

  13. Pete 2 Silver badge

    Man in the muddle

    > if you click the link and buy the item Ubuntu-maker Canonical gets a small percentage of the income,

    That's all very well and I have no problem with someone making a bit of money for their efforts, but ...

    How can this prevent someone downloading the "proper" Ubuntu <obligatory cutesy name omitted for reasons of professionalism> 12.10 and fixing it so that instead of using Canonical's referrals to Amazon it uses their own, instead?

    Obviously the simply answer is to never download from anywhere except the approved repository and to always check the checksum matches the validated version. But I can see there is a lot of scope here for scammers to stick their oar into what has always been positioned as a Linux for the non-technical users who wouldn't be au fait with the reasons for taking these extra steps.

  14. JimmyPage Silver badge

    Web apps on desktop/mobile ?

    Sorry, I can't agree with Scott that web apps are better suited to mobiles ... my experience is the reverse. Even at home, connected to my WiFi, I find web apps clunky and slow, whereas on my permanently-connected desktop they aren't *too* bad.

    Let's not start about when I'm out and about and on 3G.

  15. Liam Thom
    Meh

    Quantal Quetzal

    Really?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Quantal Quetzal

      More like Quantal Quisling

  16. Craig 2
    WTF?

    Do people really succumb to these kind of adverts? I can't imagine a situation ever arising where I'm searching my computer for something then see an advert (even if it was supremely relevant) and click to buy it. I'm not even saying I'm immune to advertising; when the `Crunchy Nut` adverts appear I have been known to suddenly fancy a bowl.

    1. Nigel 11
      Mushroom

      I am a buyer, not a sellee!

      Personally, I find unsolicited advertising of most sorts actively encourages me NOT to buy the product. The more intrusive the advert into what I'm actually trying to do at the time, the greater the enduring hostility towards whatever is being advertized.

      Exceptions, by the way, are mostly old media. Ads in trains and on walls and in newspapers and magazines present themselves while I am not busy with something else, and I may start thinking "interesting" rather than "annoying".

      A long time ago I decided that I'd always be a buyer, never a sellee. If I want something I'll actively go and look for it (and the best value method of obtaining it). If I don't yet want it, advertizing it to me has value for the advertizer between zero and minus infinity (the most annoyingly intrusive ads get the entire company, not just the product, onto my mental no-buy list until the memory fades).

  17. Turtle

    The Logic Of Advertising

    "Search for 'iPod' and Unity will find any iPod manager apps you might have installed and it may also return some results to buy an Apple iPod from Amazon."

    If I am looking for an iPod manager of some sort on my desktop, that would seem to indicate that I already own an iPod for the iPod manager to manage, wouldn't it? And Canonical and Amazon think that, because I already have an iPod, they are going to succeed in selling my another one every time I look for my iPod manager? Or that being reminded that my computer use is being monitored in order to serve ads for products which I don't need to buy because I already own, is going to make using my computer more enjoyable and productive somehow?

    And they are going to do this for the sake of earning what minuscule fraction of a cent per user per year?

    *rolls eyes*

    1. John H Woods Silver badge

      Re: The Logic Of Advertising

      Can't believe how many comments I had to read before someone pointed that out. I was going to post the same if I got to the end of the comments without it being raised, and I'd almost given up hope.

  18. Lee Dowling Silver badge

    So after spending years configuring my browsers to block adverts, replacing all my old ad-supported software with freeware/open-source, installing software to rip the unskippable ads from my DVD's, and going out of my way to configure an email reader to NOT show me anything that's probably an unsolicited ad,

    NOW my start bar will turn against me and suggest ads when I want to run a command prompt.

    Nice design decisions, guys (and supporting business model, i.e. one doomed to fail).

    And I hate the Unity interface, and I hate the "new Windows" interfaces (i.e. Vista / 7 / 8) and made a time-profit by installing Classic-shell to get run of that junk as quickly as possible when I had to move onto a Windows 7 machine recently from a 10-year-old XP image that had had countless years of setting up to get it how I wanted it. It has to be said, the underlying OS's on both sides of the coin are actually quite good, they are just let down by TERRIBLE interfaces bundled into apps and the desktop utilities which remove features and give you no options to get them back.

    I don't WANT things searching my hard disk when they are idle to propagate a menu of stuff that you might think I have installed. I know exactly how to get to every program I ever want to use and can get there before I could ever remember the name of the damn thing, let alone type it in enough to pop up in a narrow-down search. I actually spent my first few hours on my first, own personal copy of Windows 7 (after years of trials, etc. for my users) doing nothing but seeing if I could tweak the narrow-down so that I could eventually get used to it in preference.

    And yet, five minutes with Classic Shell and I was back to be (almost) as productive as before. That program is worth its weight in gold. But if they plastered it with ads, then it would be in the bin before you could find the network IP address without using command line utils on a plain-install of Windows 8.

    When you play with someone's desktop, you are interfering with the way they do work, in a way that's directly translatable to lost productivity if you get it wrong (or even if you get it right, but it takes people such a long time to get used to it that they will never recoup that loss). Control of the desktop is a hugely powerful thing that affects how people use their machines unlike any other. That's why corporate desktops get lock-downs, that's why admins have group policies to configure them, and that's why messing them up and slapping ads on them is a sure way to make people find OTHER tools, or even OS's, that don't do that.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "When you play with someone's desktop, you are interfering with the way they do work..."

      True, but I'm wondering if it isn't a bigger mistake than that.

      Given that for many people their desktop is an expression of their own individuality, your quote could equally have been "When you play with someone's desktop, you are interfering with them...".

      And that might explain why there is so much hostility to this move.

      1. johnnytruant

        Re: "When you play with someone's desktop, you are interfering with the way they do work..."

        I've wondered this very thing. The interesting thing about it is that it's true for us nerds. We customise, we tweak, we make things our own. But most users don't do that. How many non-techie people do you know who even set a non-standard desktop image, let alone adjust colour schemes, icons, set up custom launchers or keyboard shortcuts, etc. etc.

        So for them - a group who represent the overwhelming majority of computer users - this kind of thing is less of a big deal. Much less of a big deal. Canonical do lots of user testing, they don't just punt stuff out at random. They've tested this and it's gone down well. The small - albeit very vocal - minority of nerds who feel this is a personal assault on their computing privacy are going to install Arch/Fedora/Debian/Whatever. But frankly it was only a matter of time until those people ragequit anyway.

        But I think there's a great deal of people who don't post their opinions about computing on web forums are just going to say "oh look, it searches Amazon now, that's handy/annoying" and will then use/ignore the feature as appropriate. Canonical may bank some cash, and if so good for them. They are a business, after all. Personally, I consider the "mainstreaming" of Ubuntu to be a very good thing - ease of use and features like built-in search are things people like and will bring more users to the OS - and when/if it reaches the point that I'm feeling constrained by it, I shall just go and install something else.

        1. Bonus

          Re: "When you play with someone's desktop, you are interfering with the way they do work..."

          "How many non-techie people do you know who even set a non-standard desktop image,"

          Loads, although they mostly call it a screensaver for some reason.

        2. Lee Dowling Silver badge

          Re: "When you play with someone's desktop, you are interfering with the way they do work..."

          Yes, but I think you miss a step.

          At some point, every business has to pay a nerd of some breed, to implement their systems in a secure and efficient way so that information does not leak out and users don't waste their time on the Internet. As much as I'd like to give a user a text-only console with only option that did what they absolutely had to do, the reality is that we take a commercial distro and customise it to remove things that shouldn't be there before it's deployed out.

          This is where both Windows 8 and new Ubuntu's are suffering. They are creating work for those vocal nerds, who service thousands of unknowing users, and thus are going to lose out where they don't need to. There's even something to be said for a "productivity" configuration and a "home" configuration, in that case. I can name half a dozen IT admins who would kill to get business versions of Windows, Office etc. with all the junk turned off by default but compatible with the home versions. It doesn't tend to happen - Windows 8, for example, is quite clearly a "home" distro, designed for flashy tablet PC's and not corporate workstations. ME and Vista were much the same. But XP and 7 had a much more business-like approach to things and were easier to lock down and customise.

          We can't just look at the home market here and say "Nobody customises their PC". Maybe "nobody who uses the PC casually does", but who's going to spend MORE on their OS and PC in the first place? Those people who are using it as a highly customised tool in whatever respect, and thus those people who will be hit by a productivity loss at such trinkets adorning their highly-maintained desktop.

          My personal desktop has 5 icons on it. My start menus are organised into customised categories and no program is more than Windows-key, P, Category Initial, Program Initial, Program Initial away (that's a worst-case). The personal desktops of other staff that use the unmanaged machines I build are 50% horrendous messes of unkempt folders and half-installed programs and 50% clean-as-a-whistle affairs. But still the actual working managed desktops on the domain are MY pristine organised, categorised icon sets and used by 450+ users without complaint.

          My opinion of Ubuntu counts for a million times more than any single user's, or even my superior's, impression of it. Nerds veto these sorts of things in corporations as well as their personal machines. It's dangerous territory to launch a monetising assault on their desktops and that of ALL their users, especially without adequate consultation.

          I'm not saying nerds rule the world or override huge company's CEOs, but it's wrong to alienate any one category of your users when they could have been appeased by such things being a) optional, b) disabled by default.

          1. johnnytruant

            Re: "When you play with someone's desktop, you are interfering with the way they do work..."

            It's not really about customisation per se - the point I was trying to make was that we (the nerds) make things our own by customisation, but at a deeper level it's about control. My computer is a tool which I bend to my will, not a device I have to figure out to get something else done. Because I'm engaged with my machine on a deeper level than someone who just* uses it for spreadsheets/word processing/email/etc - then when "my" OS is changed, it can be more upsetting. Me, I'm not bothered, but some people are.

            I can see what you're getting at, but I think most nerds in professional positions can manage a little more objectivity than the forum dwellers bleating (again, comes around at least once a year) about how this is the end for Ubuntu. Me, I don't use Unity - but I do recommend it to people. My Mum loves it, for example. I can make decisions based on what other people need not what I personally prefer. Ubuntu doesn't alienate me by making itself more appealing to non-techies, it just makes itself a slightly different tool in my toolbox - considering this is a toolbox which is quite well stuffed with almost-identical Linux distros already, a little differentiation ain't a bad thing. I may choose not to run Ubuntu for myself, but that doesn't mean it's not something I'll choose for someone else.

            * just to be clear, there's absolutely nothing wrong with this. These people are applying their brain in different places to me. I can't do their jobs any more than they can do mine.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: "When you play with someone's desktop, you are interfering with the way they do work..."

              The thing that really ought to concern Canonical is the lack of privision by OEMs of pre-installed Ubuntu. Most who use Ubuntu are either nerds (or the clued-in if you prefer) or people who have had it installed by a friend/family member who is one of that group.

              If a significant portion of the clued-in users drop Ubuntu then I think it is likely that the 'clueless' userbase that Canonical wants to monetise will shrink markedly.

              Canonical really need to get the OS shipped by the OEMs if it wants to continue on this path.

  19. ForthIsNotDead
    Stop

    What if...

    ...they produced a version that you paid for, say five or ten dollars, that had no adverts/spyware.

    Would you pay for it?

    1. Peter Gathercole Silver badge

      Re: What if...

      Yes, but only if they also had an option to not install Unity in the first place as well!

      I actually have no problem in paying a reasonable amount for useful software, but the definition of reasonable is flexible. I would not mind paying, say, a tenner per download of Ubuntu, especially if it allowed Cannonical to include licenses for patent encumbered components (think H.264, which is free for personal use, but needs a volume license for Cannonical to install as part of the OS install - it's a volume thing).

      In the past, I did pay for an official Redhat 9.1 (no, not Fedora or RHEL) box set, because I wanted to support Redhat in their continuing efforts (and downloading 6 CDs over a V90 modem was going to take a while, not to mention finding the disk space to store it and the effort of burning the disks).

      1. Nigel 11

        Re: What if...

        @Peter

        If you want Red Hat but don't want to pay, take you pick from CentOS or Scientific Linux. Or Fedora, if you don't mind living on the bleeding edge. I used not to, until they inflicted Gnome 3 on me. Apparently Cinnamon is now a standard Fedora package, so I may pay a return visit soon.

        1. Peter Gathercole Silver badge

          Re: What if... @Nigel

          If you look at your Linux history, you will find that RedHat 9.1 was made available before either Centos or Scientific Linux were available. I have been using Ubuntu since Dapper (from about when RedHat stopped patching RH9.1), and stick to LTS releases, as the normal Ubuntu releases and Fedora moves too fast for my liking. My day-to-day systems are to use, and the less time I need to spend maintaining them, the better.

          I have been using Linux since RH 4.1, and UNIX a lot longer than that, so I do know my way around.

          And if you read what I said, I got something out of it other than the knowledge that I was helping RedHat, in that I did not have to download the iso images over a modem....

          I actually have little sympathy for the "must be completely free of cost" Linux brigade. If someone wants to create some software which has real value, and wishes to get some remuneration for the work, let them. Provided that they abide with the GPL and/or LGPL, then Linux should be a platform that they can use.

          I am getting a little jaded with the Open Source model. We are now getting to the point where very useful parts of the Open Source landscape are becoming abandonware, with the original maintainer moving on to other things, and no-one else picking up the baton. Other projects go the other way, and get managed by large groups, who then argue about direction causing fragmentation. Gnome and KDE and even the XFree86/Xorg groups have been guilty of this in the past.

          What it means is that there is no continuity, with new releases of distributions changing the tools used by default. For example, for ripping CDs, I've been through so many different ripping tools, all of which work in different ways, store the tracks in different directories, tag the files differently, use different profiles for the back-end decoders, and generally leave their detritus all over the . files in my home directory (I keep my home directory when I upgrade distributions). I would have been absolutely happy sticking with Grip, which was small, efficient, and suited me perfectly. I could have asked to become the maintainer, but I have too little time to do what I need to, let alone taking on a software project.

    2. FatGerman
      Headmaster

      Re: What if...

      No, because it's open source and therefore I can remove the adverts/spyware myself. Plus I wouldn't give anyone money for what is basically a rolling beta that breaks every time I upgrade it. Make it as stable as the distro it's based on (Debian) and then I might consider it.

  20. Chimp

    Unity...

    ... works rather well for me. If you need an unencumbered OS with a short learning curve for a fairly large group of users, it's fine.

    If you don't like it, try Mint, another fine distro.

    1. Peter Gathercole Silver badge

      Re: Unity... @Chimp

      I'm not arguing there.

  21. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    A Sad Tale

    Walks into hall, switches on outside light. Opens front door and peering out into the dark cries, "Ubuntu, where have you gone?"

  22. WylieCoyoteUK
    Happy

    Unity is Ok with me

    I quite like Unity, been using it for a while now.

    Compared to say Win8, it is quite a nice easy to use interface.

    It is especially good for newbies and non technical users.

    Mind you, since I bought a tablet, I mainly use my desktop for writing and image manipulation, so I'm in Android more than any other OS these days..

  23. 45RPM Silver badge
    Thumb Up

    So what?

    I like Ubuntu. I like what they're doing with Unity - it's brave, and God knows that the Linux GUI world needs some bravery. Sure, it's often a step back - but it will lead to a better desktop eventually, I'm certain of it. Mac OS X 10.0 was such a step back that it was actually unusable. Vista was, well, Vista - unfortunately. Progress sometimes means temporary sacrifice (sadly, it sometimes means permanent sacrifice too!)

    As for the shopping lens, yes, it's tacky. Yes, I don't like it. But look at it this way, there's no such thing as a free lunch - and Ubuntu is a very tasty lunch indeed. Pay up, cheapskates - and by paying you'll either have to put up with Amazon (and maybe buy once in a while, ensuring the future of Ubuntu) or put in a little effort to disable this lens.

    As for me, I shall install Quetzal. But I'm really looking forward to:

    Randy Rhino

    Sexy Squirrel

    Tarty Toucan

    …and so forth. Well, we've had Whorey Hedgehog, so why not?

    1. johnnytruant

      Re: So what?

      Reliant Robin.

    2. Nigel 11

      Re: So what?

      X-rated Xenosaur?

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      @45RPM - Re: So what?

      Did Ubuntu paid anything to Debian ? Who are the cheapskates here ? Also if Ubuntu feels entitled to get some money they should ask me to pay for Ubuntu instead of selling me to Amazon.

      1. 45RPM Silver badge
        Flame

        Re: @45RPM - So what?

        Given that Ubuntu is an OS, not a business, I very much doubt that Ubuntu paid anyone. Canonical may have paid money to the Debian Project - I have no idea. You'll need to check that yourself. I'm damned certain that Canonical has advanced Linux's cause and code base more than most though, which in turn benefits Debian.

        Sheesh. All these noobs. I'm amazed that they know enough about computing to find this website, much less sign up and comment on its articles. <shakes head in mock despair>

  24. DvorakUser

    Does no one realize...

    ... that you are capable of removing the Amazon integration features? Or that they're working on a simle 'kill-switch' for the end-user to disable them? Admittedly, though, having an opt-in/out checkbox during installation would be nice....

    I just don't understand all the hate towards the Unity UI. Sure, it's not Gnome 2 or KDE, but I find it to be a fairly decent UI. Even fired it up on an eeePC 701 without too many major problems (biggest one: the dash is too large for the screen).

    1. MissingSecurity

      Re: Does no one realize...

      "I just don't understand all the hate towards the Unity UI."

      I'll give you some. I am not a Linux Guru by any stretch. I'll push linux until the my grave probably, but I'm still primary working with windows. When I first switched to Linux, I tried Ubuntu, Fedora, and even messed with slackware. Ubuntu was by far the quickest for me to grasp from an entire OS standpoint. I could correlate between windows utilities and Linux utilities and operate.

      With the New UI I can't do that. I have no fucking clue how that setup is suppose to be used or designed. When I dropped down in menu in 11.04 I could make the connection "Administrative tasks", "System Tools". Sure if I know the CLI commands or already know the utility I can search but man does it seem that no matter when I dig in that UI its never where I was expecting it to be.

      It appears that Ubuntu wanted you to click applications by opening the unity GUI, but at best it seems like a gloried book mark. If you like it and understand it, kudos, you also probably have more Linux knowledge than I, thankfully I saw Mint on here a while ago and it was my new instant favorite with CentOS as a nice alternate to Redhat and Ubuntu Server.

    2. Peter Gathercole Silver badge

      Re: Does no one realize...

      Unity is a personal thing. I've noticed that younger people often are happy with running one application at a time, full screen. These people can cope with Unity quite well.

      Everybody else, especially those used to *lots* of windows, Unity is a distraction, and not only is the change unwelcome, but the way of working is foreign.

      I know that you can set up multiple windows, and 'pane' them, but the way of controlling the positioning is not as easy as in Gnome.

      On my eeePC 701, I found Unity unusable, mainly because it did not like the small screen, but also because of the lack of graphics power leading to severe lag in updating Dash.

  25. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Patents

    I'd rather see some of the money being used to fight stupid patents of the sort that Amazon supports.

  26. ppp.an
    Devil

    Big deal. (Pun intended). Just disable the Lens. I do not begrudge them trying to make some money. Especially when I can disable it. However, I wonder what the non-technical world of users think about this. My parents mayn't even notice, or care.

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    $$$

    Surely this will increase Amazon's revenue beyond proportions. Imagine when all Ubuntu users start shopping on Amazon.

  28. Robert Grant
    Linux

    Everyone panic and-oh wait. This is Linux.

    sudo echo "127.0.0.1 amazon.com # I also have root, Mark" >> /etc/hosts

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Everyone panic and-oh wait. This is Linux.

      More effective to kill it in the source, so you can still use Amazon if you want. I'm sure someone will produce a diff and a script to do that pretty quickly.

    2. CaptainHook

      Re: Everyone panic and-oh wait. This is Linux.

      "sudo echo "127.0.0.1 amazon.com # I also have root, Mark" >> /etc/hosts"

      *****

      That shouldn't work because the requests are going to Canonical first, and then being forwarded. Supposedly with any identifying data removed.

      Trouble is, we have no way to confirm that. There must be some identifying data sent to canonical and we just have to trust it's removed before Amazon see it. Even if the data stream from canonical to Amazon was audited tomorrow and shown no identifying information was forwarded to Amazon, they could flip a switch and send that data the day after tomorrow.

      There would be no way for us to tell the if data is stripped of identifying information except maybe if Amazon screw up and send back ads which are related to you personally rather than just the most recent search results. For example, having an ad based on previous shopping done outside of the Ubuntu installation you are using the seach lens on.

  29. paulc
    Mushroom

    abandoned ship when they started pushing Unity on people

    and removing means for changing how desktop customisations worked. When I found I couldn't tell the screensaver to use a different directory for the slideshow images and the gnome developer had a smugger than thou "we know best" attitude when it came to bug reports. Gnome using a registry was also a major fail for me...

    Ran off to Mint Debian with LXDE and rolling updates... none of that praying the update works every six months or finding it was better to wipe and do a fresh install after having a borked upgrade.

  30. vpbp

    What about the other 95 per cent?

    Yes - major UI changes can be disruptive, and for us 'tech savvy' Linux users all this stuff may be enough to drive us away to Mint, Fedora or whatever - but we'll still be using some flavour of GNU/Linux, so where's the harm?

    But remember, Linux only accounts for around 5% of users. Maybe Canonical really are doing the right thing with Ubuntu. Maybe it's the other 95% that are the target audience. And when they've learned to appreciate what's on offer, they can move on to other distros if they need to.

    You've got the choice, so use it.

  31. MrWibble
    Unhappy

    If the lens was just that, it would be fine (i.e. if I wanted to go shopping, I'd click on the shopping lens and search. Great.).

    However, this puts it into the default home "dash". So everything you try to do on your local machine, will also have an advert for something possibly connected to your "search". So open dash, type in "sound" (to maybe open the sound controls?) and you'll get a load of amazon adverts for headphones, soundcards, and lots of other irrelevant (to the task I was trying to do) shite.

    That's where the problem is to me.

  32. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Pray that you don't have any applications called "analytics" (or similar), because it searches amazon whilst you're typing, and may come back with some "interesting" results if you're not quick at typing the letter "y"...

  33. Tom 7

    I'm taking my four machines off Ubuntu and off elsewhere

    not because of this but because more and more programs are stopping working with every upgrade.

    Your target audience may be the 95% but you need the 5% to at least consider not swearing when its mentioned.

  34. Steve Graham
    Meh

    grep would be better

    Nobody has mentioned that Amazon's search functionality is next to useless anyway. Many a time when I've actually wanted to buy something off them, I've had to resort to a Google search of the site instead.

    As a concrete example, I was interested in a Freeview HD recorder. Amazon came back with over 300 hits, the vast majority being not Freeview, not HD, or not recorders (or none of the above). And there's no way to refine a search.

    Contrast that with eBay, where the item descriptions are mostly written by incompetent members of the public -- yet you can find stuff!

  35. FatGerman
    FAIL

    "...because the only way to learn what's not perfect is to have other people - real people - use it."

    This is true. So why not, before dumping yet another load of half-finished shit into a release, spend some real time beta testing it. And then actually fix some of the bugs that get reported. Ubuntu's current strategy is to release a beta about 3 weeks before the release, let about 2 people use it, then release it anyway. This is why fewer and fewer people are using it, because they're utterly beholden to their release schedule, and making things actually work is secondary.

  36. Henry Wertz 1 Gold badge

    *shrug*

    *shrug*, as long as it can be turned off I don't care too much. That said, I'm not about to use Unity anyway.

  37. BozNZ
    Facepalm

    Anyone using this?

    This is becoming more of a Unity rant, maybe Unity is not to everyones taste but many actually prefer it.

    Linux Mint is a nice Ubuntu derivitive for people who prefer a more traditional desktop, nobodies stopping you from using it but remember not everyone wants command prompts and root access from linux, they just want to write a letter and go on facebook.

    The real issue is amazon search sponsorship integration, this is a beta release and they are planning a kill switch, did anyone read the fucking article!

  38. James Hughes 1

    So many Unity haters

    Presumably the ones who tried it two years ago and never looked at it again.

    I quite like it, been using it on home machine since it came out - it's improved a lot, and works for everything I want it to do, which is browsing, email, some Eclipse work, and SSH to my Raspberry PI. All apps I use work fine, although F-spot seems to have fallen off the upgrade cycle - not Canonical fault - just a lack of developers I think. On the whole considerably better than the other half's Vista machine, and even my 6 year old can use it.

    AT leat someone out there is trying to mix things up and bit and get some GUI improvements going.

  39. mIRCat
    Paris Hilton

    Greener fields

    Even before Unity was released, I left for the verdant hills of Debian.

    Paris, because even penguins can appreciate her hills.

  40. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    morons

    I wish the ubuntu haters would shut the fuck up. We get it, you wish everything looked like it was from 1995 and. Improved because you pea brain can't grasp new concepts. We get it that you think no one should get paid for their work because your pea brain doesn't value anyone's work but your own.

    You are probably a low-paid helpdesk monkey that no one appreciates and it makes you angry and lash out at everyone. That's not healthy and that's why you'll die alone and forgotten.

    So please do us a favour and shut up about your ubuntu hater and what ever lame hipster approved distro you use.

    1. Peter Gathercole Silver badge
      Linux

      Re: morons

      I think it is you that needs to take a chill pill. 1995 was a long time ago, and even Windows 95 was new/still in beta. UNIX-like OS's were using CDE or Motif, neither of which resembles Gnome 2, or simple window managers like FVWM.

      But you appear to be advocating change for changes sake, merely to keep a product moving. Yes, there are people who will like Unity. And there will be people who (like myself) would like to keep a patched working OS going with as little change as possible, because change costs time and money, and I have too little of either free to adjust the way I work. Is it too much to ask for a system that will still be patched (even LTS releases stop being patched) without having to alter their habits.

      I have tried every Ubuntu since Unity was released, and I still find that it does not do what I need it to do without serious effort. I generally run with the desktop completely covered up with many windows, so anything put there is no good to me at all. I can use Dash from the side panel, but it appears to me to take longer to find things than static menus. I cannot customise the side panel as easily as with Gnome (may be a learning curve, but I think not), and applications opening full screen are unnecessary. Mixing mouse and keyboard actions in a single operation is in-efficient, and relying on keyboard short-cuts (even to an emacs user) leads complexity that takes time to learn.

      I only have so much learning bandwidth. Much of what I have is taken up by my quite challenging work, changing phones, adopting a tablet, and learning to use whatever new consumer device has ended up with a complex UI. There will be the inevitable application changes with 12.04 (LTS release - see above), and the last thing I need to do is learn a new desktop UI as well. This will be true even if I switch to Gnome 3 after installing Precise Pangolin.

      Oh, and by the way, I am a valued and well paid (comments about cost notwithstanding) IT professional working supporting complex HPC systems, not as you put it a 'helpdesk monkey'". I have been a strong Ubuntu advocate since Dapper Drake, but have nearly reached the end of what I can put up with. I cannot tell who you are because of your use of AC, but I strongly suspect that I was working with UNIX systems and GUIs (such as SunView, AT&T Blit, Layers) , early Windows, GEM, Arthur, and even Lisa a little, while you were still in nappies!

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: morons

        @ Peter Gathercole

        I'm not the original AC.

        Quite frankly I wasn't impressed by their little rant, but I understand the sentiments and at this point I broadly agree. Your reply was more measured and a bit more "adult", but worthless.

        The fact that you have ? years as a "valued and well paid IT professional" makes your opinion no more valuable or worthwhile or important than any other "helpdesk monkey", or average user, or the original AC, or the corpse of my dead grandmother who had never touched a computer in her life (or after it). Experience counts for exactly nothing when it comes to evaluating a desktop environment because such an evaluation is entirely subjective to the needs, biases and aesthetics of the user.

        I find Unity to be adequate. Not a ringing endorsement, eh?

        I'm getting to the point that I simply don't care any more what you or any one else thinks about Unity. All of you have expressed an opinion (or moaned and bitched and whined), stated your preference (or huffed and puffed) and then moved on to something else or regressed to Gnome Shell (or spat the dummy and pouted). Unity is here to stay, get on board or go seek a new distro.

        1. Peter Gathercole Silver badge
          Unhappy

          Re: morons @AC 16:30

          Well. What can I say. If you don't care, you wouldn't have commented. If you don't want to hear other peoples views, don't read the comments.

          I know that my past usage of UIs is of no real relevance, but I was using it to counter the "helpdesk monkey" label of the original AC. I know I play the "I've been around a long time" too much in these forums, it's a personality flaw I have, but I find it difficult to counter an accusation of no breadth of experience without providing some background, and boy, do I have a lot.

          I know, and I have said several times, that Unity will suit some (maybe a lot of) people, but it does not me. I know that it's a personal choice, but I get as annoyed by people who say "Unity is THE way forward for everyone", when it's clearly not. I try to never push my views on other people, I just comment on the way I feel. And I feel that Canonical are doing exactly what I don't with their push to Unity. If they had installed Gnome still, and given you the option of switching (something that you can do yourself I know) I would be far less critical. After all, it's not as if modern systems are short of disk space, and much of Gnome is actually already installed. But they didn't.

          Having switched distro's several times since I first used Linux (damn, there I go again), I know that I can do so again, so I have no problems there.

          But Ubuntu was, and still is, a distro with a large and well maintained repository. This is one of the reasons I liked it and I have suggested in the past to anybody and everybody that they try Ubuntu as it could have been the dominant distro, something that is needed to achieve the critical mass required to get Linux accepted. But I will probably never suggest to someone looking for a different experience that they install a current Ubuntu ever again, because I will either not be using it myself, or will using a different GUI. Maybe that is a loss to the Ubuntu community, maybe not. I have no pretensions about being influential in my professional life, let alone my personal one (I work with real UNIX most of the time still - Linux is just what I use at home).

          1. James Hughes 1

            Re: morons @AC 16:30

            Given you have limited learning bandwidth, why do you keep switching distros? Pick one, standardise on it. That's what I did with Ubuntu, and Unity's learning curve isn't too bad. (Ever tried to learn GIT? You certainly don't have the bandwidth for that if you stopped with Unity)

            1. Peter Gathercole Silver badge

              @James Hughes 1

              I don't always switch distros, and I did standardise on Ubuntu back at Dapper, but eventually, even LTS releases stop being patched and you have to upgrade or be left behind.

              I only switched from Hardy to Lucid when the patches stopped, and it is the switch from Lucid to Precise and the likely necessity to either accept Unity, or deviate from the mainstream that I am not looking forward to.

              I switched from Redhat 9.1 to Dapper to Hardy to Lucid because they fell out of support. Other versions of many different distros have been played with on test boxes just to see what is going on.

              My current learning bandwidth is mainly being taken up with an IBM PERCS HPC cluster, xCAT, GPFS and all of the other things that make up such systems, both hardware and software (my job is fairly unique). I assure you that that is MUCH more bandwidth consuming than learning Unity!

  41. Graham Hawkins
    FAIL

    The Amazon link make the lens useless.

    I booted the beta CD. Wanted to see whether cclive (an on-line video ripper available in 12.04) is available in 12.10. So I type 'cclive' in the lens, and immediately get a load ads for stuff from Amazon, largely pertaining to the band '10cc'. Nothing at all about 'cclive' the application....

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Useless?

      "So I type 'cclive' in the lens, and immediately get a load [of] ads for stuff from Amazon, largely pertaining to the band '10cc'. Nothing at all about 'cclive' the application...."

      Well then it's working exactly as intended. Good. : )

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