back to article Ay caramba, Ubuntu 12.10: Get it right on Amazon!

There's much to admire in Canonical’s Quantal Quetzal, which continues to refine and improve the Unity desktop, but you'd be forgiven if you missed the positives thanks to the late injection of a little Bezos since Ubuntu 12.04. As if the move to Unity hadn’t been contentious (and bumpy) enough, Canonical has dipped into …

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  1. Irongut

    Sending search terms to 3rd party

    So does this version of Ubuntu send all search terms to the likes of FB & Twitter or only when you say you want to search their sites? I don't do social networking so I have no desire to have my search terms sent to such sites.

    I think it's time to investigate whether the gf's netbook can run Fedora, Canonical seem to have made deliberate decisions in recent years to make me ditch them.

    1. keithpeter Silver badge
      Linux

      Re: Sending search terms to 3rd party

      With Fedora you will be reinstalling every so often, and the standard interface will be changing as they develop Gnome Shell.

      If the significant other wants something that won't change much and that is in the RHEL world, I'd suggest CentOS/Scientific Linux/PUIAS currently at v6.3. Solid and support until 2018 or something daft with point increments. Just remember no mono libraries by default so no Banshee or Hugin Panorama...

      1. dajames
        Boffin

        Re: Sending search terms to 3rd party

        @keithpeter

        Just remember no mono libraries by default so no Banshee or Hugin Panorama...

        Hugin has a dependency on either the autopano-sift library (which requires mono) or autopano-sift-c (which doesn't), so one can run Hugin without mono.

        Hurrah!

        1. This post has been deleted by its author

        2. keithpeter Silver badge
          Pint

          Re: Sending search terms to 3rd party

          @dajames

          "Hugin has a dependency on either the autopano-sift library (which requires mono) or autopano-sift-c (which doesn't), so one can run Hugin without mono."

          Excellent, I shall try to compile from source as I can't find Hugin in any of the RHEL repositories.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Linux

      Re: Sending search terms to 3rd party

      I've moved to Arch when Canonical dropped Kubuntu, in the 12.04 version. I was already pissed with a few questionable decisions (like disabling hibernation) and some idiotic moderators in the forums, so I started checking other distros. OpenSuSe almost won me over, until I had to use Yast. I had forgotten how bad it was... It has improved since I first used it 12 years ago, but it is still awful. I can't point exactly what, but it always seems to get in the way, instead of helping setting things up.

      ArchLinux works very well, is always up-to-date, and now even has a couple of derivative distros that let you use a live version and a gui installer. It also has a vibrant and very knowledgeable community, so for me moving to it from kubuntu is a win-win situation. Give Manjaro a try, if installing from a console is not your thing.

      1. Peter Ford
        Go

        Kubuntu is still there!

        My home PC runs 12.04. Kubuntu - I really couldn't get work done with Unity...

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Kubuntu is still there!

          It is still there - but has been relegated to a "community" flavour, down from its semi-official status. No official support from canonical, etc.

          1. yossarianuk

            Re: Kubuntu is still there!

            Kubuntu's future actually looks brighter than before now.

            Blue systems is owned by a billionaire and they have hired the main kwin developer as a permentment meber of staff - the first project will be migrating kwin to wayland

            http://blog.martin-graesslin.com/blog/2012/10/kwin-hacking/

            It does sound like change in Kubuntu to being sponsored by Blue systems could be good for the entire KDE world (and thus good for us users seeing as both gnome3 + unity are just not usable desktops imo)

            IMO KDE 4.9.x is the best desktop for any OS - if you look at windows future (windows 8) there is no alternative for people who aren't children/trendy teens and actually want to get some work done.

      2. Chika
        Linux

        Re: Sending search terms to 3rd party

        It isn't Yast that might end up killing openSUSE for me - it's some of the senseless revisions that they have stuck under the bonnet. A combination of Yast, Control Centre and Webmin have done me over the years but the attitude to end users is really winding me up.

        Trouble is that this article seems to indicate that Canonical have a similar approach, and I've been burned by Fedora in the past too.

        I've no problem with openSUSE 11.4 but both the 12.x versions have pissed me off. If Kubuntu is no more as somebody has mentioned here, then that's another distro I'll be striking off my list. I've heard good things of Mint...

      3. keithpeter Silver badge
        Boffin

        Re: Sending search terms to 3rd party

        "...and some idiotic moderators in the forums..."

        If that was ubuntuforums.org I'm glad it wasn't just me.

        Try a Live SciLi or an install of PUIAS Linux. RHEL based and very nicely done.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Sending search terms to 3rd party

      I don't think Ubuntu sends search terms to Facebook or Twitter at all. I think this is a poorly researched article which has blurred the distinction between the new WebApps functionality and the Dash shopping results.

  2. sebacoustic
    Coat

    Integrating popular websites into the desktop is hardly a new idea

    "Active Desktop" anyone? That was singularly useless as well. Hmm something's not right, things can't be "singular" and "as well".

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    Boo

    Canonical have lost a hell of a lot of goodwill with this idea!

    Ubuntu used to be the posterboy of the Linux community.

    If anything it will make people equate Linux with "open" intrusion.

    No link to the grep defect in the article?

    https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/gnome-terminal/+bug/1055766

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Boo

      Canonical have lost a hell of a lot of goodwill with this idea!

      Actually, the rot set in a lot earlier. I can accept they are following a vision, but I have come to the conclusion that it's not a vision I share. For all my respect for Shuttleworth, I suspect I won't touch much of Ubuntu again - i came off that distro quite a while back when they started making a heaving mess of the UI. It may work for some people, but I think I'm not one of them :)

      From the article: Like the Lens, the Amazon app – and web apps in general – are another gamble on Canonical's part.

      A lost one IMHO. Part of my reasons for using Linux (and other Unix-y variants) is because it has less BS floating around that ships you data off to 3rd parties. So, not happy with Ubuntu there either.

      Nope. Not for me. Hasn't been for me for quite some time..

      1. This post has been deleted by its author

    2. yossarianuk

      Re: Boo

      Luckily you can run Kubuntu - this has all the improvements that Ubuntu brings without having to use their horrible tablet (windows 8) style desktop.

      I.e you can have all the packages, HW support, etc that Ubuntu has without being forced to use the crap that is unity (what choice to Windows 8 users have?)

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    I can see it now...

    But wait; there's even more. If you order now you'll even get Amazon's widely known, heavily discussed, user friendly, super duper search engine which doens't only allow you to search your desktop; it searches the Internet too. Everything you always wanted in one box!

    If you order within the next 3 hours we'll even throw in our self proclaimed ultra violent firewall which will help you to keep your computer safe from anything nasty on the Internet AND improves your searching experience too. Ever saw someone use a browser where the website looked like a pile of uninteresting words?

    Thats because they used programs such as AdBlock or NoScript. With our self proclaimed ultra violent security suite you don't need those any more. So we did you a huge favor and removed them from the repositories entirely!

    Now you can be sure to always get the information which you want and require!

    TIME IS RUNNING OUT... Please call the number on screen now and order YOUR copy of the highly popular Ubuntu desktop!

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Trollface

      Re: ...where the website looked like a pile of uninteresting words?

      Yes!

      And I used to vote those articles "Utterly terrible," but I can't do that any longer.

      Open and shut, I suppose.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I can see it now...

      Why don't they gust go the whole hog. Disable the Internet and link to Amazon

  5. Anonymous Custard
    WTF?

    Bloat

    I recall one of the old "selling points" of Linux vs Windows used to be that it was streamlined, and there was nothing in there that you didn't want/need as bits could easily be added or removed as required.

    Correct me if I'm wrong, but whilst this Amazon Lens can be turned off, it looks like it can't actually be removed. So here I'm carrying around in Dash something that I actively turn off and don't need/want/use, but must still carry around in the search coding?

    And it also seems somewhat at odds with the other article on el Reg today about Canonical pushing Ubuntu as an XP replacement for business. I'm sure most businesses are going to love the idea of Canonical's servers asking Amazon's search engine every time a user searches for a locally stored document (or the content therein) if they accidentally haven't disabled all such commercial lens features, or they've been re-activated or added by an update or even by local user action.

    I'm serviously wondering if the Linux partition on my netbook will need to change flavours soon to something that isn't bloating.

    1. LinkOfHyrule
      Paris Hilton

      Re: Bloat

      Well to be a Windows replacement it needs to suck just as hard so things like this are what's required so that users get the same kind of user experience!

      Paris because she likes to analyze things

      1. fixit_f

        Re: Bloat

        Surely anyone with any sense will have known from the outset that a large commercial organisation pumping money into a free OS wasn't perhaps doing it completely altruistically? Just as with facebook, what initially was a freebie now has to make a return as a business proposition.

        The beauty of LINUX is that this isn't a problem - simply hop distros, even a newboe should be able to work out how to do that these days if they got as far as installing ubuntu in the first place. I think Canonical have done a lot to raise the profile of LINUX, this isn't a massive intrusion and it can be disabled. I'm not going to get too het up about it, that's the joy of choice. Personally I'm platform agnostic, I run Win7 on my desktop, mint on my 17 inch laptop, ubuntu on my netbook - I'll upgrade the netbook to latest when it's released, turn the search feature off, and if I still don't like it I can install another debian based distro without any significant hassle.

        I can see where the privacy advocates are coming from, but given the options available from my perspective there's not much unexpected to see here, and to make out there is is simply slinging unwarranted mud at LINUX as a whole, isn't it? What am I missing?

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Bloat

      QUOTE: Correct me if I'm wrong, but whilst this Amazon Lens can be turned off, it looks like it can't actually be removed. So here I'm carrying around in Dash something that I actively turn off and don't need/want/use, but must still carry around in the search coding?

      You're wrong. It can be removed, and quite easily too.

      sudo apt-get remove unity-lens-shopping

      1. Anonymous Custard
        Pint

        Re: Bloat

        Thanks - I'm at the stage of just playing with Linux at the moment (my machine came with Win7 Home Prem which does what I need it to, but I like to see what's what elsewhere too) and so wasn't so sure if it was removable or not.

        Anyway my partition changed flavour yesterday from Ubuntu to Lubuntu, which seems somewhat more happy on the machine (an Aspire One) anyway. But have a pint anyway for the educational tip :)

  6. Tim Walker
    Thumb Down

    'Bye-'bye, 'buntu?

    I doff my cap to Ubuntu and Canonical for all they (and the open-source developer-contributors) have done to get desktop Linux where it is today - in the sense of "at best, it works better than Windows" - but the more I hear about the path Ubuntu is taking, the more I think I wouldn't put it on a new PC in our house.

    A colleague has asked me which Linux distro they could put on an old WinXP PC they have. I replied along the lines of "for a works-out-of-the-box desktop, Mint; for a fast and lean tinkering system, Arch". I'd now only consider Ubuntu for someone who wants a truly "consumer" Linux - if I was going to be a PC's regular sysadmin, I'd install Arch (as I already have on my netbook and Raspberry Pi).

    That said: maybe I'll give Ubuntu QQ a spin, and reserve a proper judgement until then...

    1. Ian Johnston Silver badge
      Thumb Up

      Re: 'Bye-'bye, 'buntu?

      I've given up on Ubuntu - too bloated, too crufty, too horrible - but I have found Lubuntu great for slower machines and Xubuntu for the others.

      1. bailey86

        Re: 'Bye-'bye, 'buntu?

        Xubuntu for the win!!!

        Actually, Linus himself (all bow) switched to XFCE a while back.

        I switched to Xubuntu and it's great. I'd also recommend it for normal users - Menu, task bar, fast - what more do you want?

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: 'Bye-'bye, 'buntu?

          Indeed. In fact, you don't even need to reinstall to get the benefits of Xubuntu. Just pop the xubuntu-desktop package onto an existing Ubuntu install and choose it as your desktop the next time you log in, If you really want to save space and avoid loading updates to stuff you don't use then you could rip out the Unity packages but that is a bit of a pain and it isn't really necessary.

          1. Fatman

            Re: rip out the Unity packages

            Is the first thing I do with a new install of Ubuntu, after installing gnome-session-fallback.

            1. This post has been deleted by its author

  7. auburnman
    Trollface

    Troll the stats

    I wonder if they keep a top ten list of searched for items through the lens? Might be worth seeing if "Windows XP/7" could be brought to the top of the most popular search list with a little gaming.

  8. MrWibble

    Sticking on 12.04 for now.

    Yes, the amazon crap can be removed (sudo apt-get remove unity-shopping-lens, or something like that - but it should be opt in, and in it's own scope, rather than the home page), but it's buggy as hell for me. Sound is screwed (on a system that's been fine with Ubuntu sound for the past 4 years), Unity is slow as hell, and well, there's nothing here that makes me want to upgrade.

    Maybe I should look into Arch. But I do actually like unity as it is for now...

  9. ScottME
    Coat

    Back to Debian, I suspect

    I've been using Ubuntu for about four or five years now, and to begin with it was great. I have always been quick to install the latest release, and have lived with 12.04 since it came out. I've been feeling increasingly disappointed with recent releases, and I realise I'm just not all that happy with Ubuntu any more. I really don't like Unity, and I sure as hell don't like the sound of the Amazon Lens, so I will most likely pass on 12.10. 12.04 is a long term support release so I'll be OK to stick with it for a while but I reckon in due course I'll probably just head on back to Debian, which is where I came to Ubuntu from. It's always been a safe, if boring, choice but I now appreciate that boring is good for something like an OS.

  10. Liassic
    Big Brother

    Lost the plot

    They lost me when they brought Unity in.

    They seem to be going further and further away from my path, especially around the privacy/data side.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Linux

      Re: Lost the plot

      Perhaps it always was just a rich man's toy, but this is the point where that became obvious.

      (12.04 here, with MATE desktop)

    2. ysth

      Re: Lost the plot

      I said the same. Then a co-worker inspired me to actually try it - to just install 12.04 and live with it for a couple of weeks. So I did, with just the stock 12.04 experience, no tweaks, no add ons, and I adapted. It's really not that bad.

      1. keithpeter Silver badge
        Boffin

        Re: Lost the plot

        Yup, it seems to take a couple of weeks of 'just using it' to get your head around Unity. Same with Gnome Shell on Gnome 3. I'm sort of flitting between those along with a mad scientist desktop involving IceWM with the Ambiance theme/Thunar/dmenu and a lot of customised shortcuts.

        I'm trying not to 'distro-hop' but just stick with the LTS and get some work done on other projects. Debian Squeeze on the laptop.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        FAIL

        Re: It's really not that bad.

        "Not that bad," is what one puts up with in the MS-no-choice world. We even pay to put up with it.

        "Not that bad" is not good enough in the free-choice Linux world. It doesn't even begin to be acceptible.

  11. Get the puck outa here
    Facepalm

    NSFW insta-searches

    I'm a slow typist. I'll have to stop searching for Scunthorpe United, or Dildo Run Park in Newfoundland.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "...if you're a slow typer"

    I was going to type a n i c , honest I was! You can't blame me if the "a" and "s" are next to each other.

    And, you mean typist.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Coat

      Re: "...if you're a slow typer"

      And yes, it was a big titanic I was googling for. It was big! And I didn't want to waste my time with reults for models of the titanic...

      Models? Hmmm...

      Mines the long raincoat

  13. Anonymous IV

    The reason for Ubuntu's fall from grace?

    I wonder just how much of the current dissatisfaction with Ubuntu can be laid at the door of Mark Shuttleworth's increasingly stupid release names?

    Techie to Managing Director: "I think we ought to investigate installing Linux on our desktops."

    ManDir to Techie: "You mean the thing known as Rabid Rhino or Sizzling Sausages? You must be joking - I'd be laughed off the golf club committee!"

    Remember the old tagline: "Can Compaq be any good at making PCs when then can't even spell their name correctly?"

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: The reason for Ubuntu's fall from grace?

      There are a lot of reasons to mock Ubuntu, their release names are not one of them.

      If you are not smart enough to use the release code 12.10 when trying to present the technical options to your boss then I suggest you go get a job that requires less intellectual capacity.

      Perhaps flipping burgers would be a better match for your talents?

    2. garbo
      Stop

      Re: The reason for Ubuntu's fall from grace?

      Now what comes after Quantal Quetzal? I breathlessly await the arrival of Unctuous Uakari.

      But what happens after Zombie Zebra? Does Mad Mark go back to Anxious Antelope, or "Just Call the Whole Thing Off"?

      1. David Hicks

        Re: The reason for Ubuntu's fall from grace?

        You know that R comes after Q, right?

        There's a few years left in their first run around the alphabet so I think we're ok for now.

        1. Peter Simpson 1
          Thumb Up

          Only choice

          Randy Rhino

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Only choice

            Surely Rampant Rabbit?

            1. Simon Westerby 1
              Happy

              Re: Only choice

              And I wonder how the Amazon Lens would respond to your search for an upgrade for your "Rampant Rabbit" ?

              ;)

    3. dajames
      Linux

      Re: The reason for Ubuntu's fall from grace?

      I wonder just how much of the current dissatisfaction with Ubuntu can be laid at the door of Mark Shuttleworth's increasingly stupid release names?

      I used to hope we'd have Perfect Penguin by now ... but as 12.04 was spoilt by Unity it would have been an empty claim.

      [I don't think Unity is as bad as most people say, especially on very small screens. It's a valid successor to UNR, but should never have been made the default environment on a desktop PC.]

  14. ysth

    A PR failure?

    Lots of people buy things from Amazon. Lots of people use Ubuntu and wouldn't mind doing something easy to support it. Seems like they've just made that possible. Is that such a big deal?

    As a search tool, the new feature sounds useless, I admit. So think of it as a Donate button - except that it donates Amazon's money, not yours.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: A PR failure?

      You seem to be pretty good at PR and stuff like that. What do you inhale to attain this level of illumination ?

    2. Vic

      Re: A PR failure?

      > Is that such a big deal?

      Yes.

      The problem is not so much that the lens exists, it is that it is installed by default.

      If it were opt-in, it would be fine. But it isn't, so it isn't...

      Vic.

      1. ysth

        Re: A PR failure?

        Think of a website with a Donate button; should that be opt in? The first time you visit, present you with a confirm dialog "Would you like to see the Donate button?" and store the result in a cookie?

        I haven't tried 12.10 and am unlikely to any time soon, but it really doesn't sound like that big a deal.

        1. Vic

          Re: A PR failure?

          > Think of a website with a Donate button;

          That's an inapproprate analogy; this is more like a website that automatically takes a donation unless you opt out...

          Vic.

    3. Rob Moir

      Re: A PR failure?

      There's at least two issues here

      Firstly consent - things like this simply should be opt in.

      Then there's what you're opting in to - the Amazon search Lens gives poor results because they don't share *enough* information with Amazon to get decent recommendations back for the user.

      So what they've ended up with is the worst of both worlds. Even if the only issue you think is important is "helping Ubuntu via Amazon's donations" then the fact is that they've cocked that up.

    4. davtom

      Re: A PR failure?

      What if you're not particularly switched on about affiliate marketing, but you've clicked through Nectar's website to get cookied for some Nectar points when you buy Amazon stuff, then you go through this lens without being aware that the affiliate commission that pays for your Nectar points will be redirected to Canonical Ltd?

      But it's not just that. You're not asked whether you want to do it in the first place. That's the first thing that's really bad about this.

      The second issue is more serious. Heretofore, whatever you enter into that search box never leaves your local machine. Now, it will. If you enter something that's supposed to remain private into it to search your local machine for stuff, it will be sent to Amazon's servers, so you lose your privacy.

      You can remove this feature as others have pointed out, but it really shouldn't be there in the first place. At least, not without an opt-in.

      Now Canonical are getting more secretive about future releases, if the press are to be believed. Do you know what's going on? They're NOT LISTENING to the people who use their version of Linux, and they don't even WANT to. This has now happened enough times for me to finally make the decision to move away from them. It's not like there's no choice...

    5. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: As a search tool, the new feature sounds useless

      Are you shopping when you search your hard drive? What kind of idiot thought that was a good idea?

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The past does not repeat, but it rhymes....

    Isn't this the sort of arc that Ximian followed? Trying to make Linux into a platform for them to sell you services? And we all know how splendidly that went.

    And so once again, Gnome and Linux get turned into <voice type="annoying commercial announcer">a unique opportunity to engage the customer in a dialog to guide them into a buying decision</voice>.

  16. Don Jefe
    Meh

    Common Sense Coming Home to Roost

    I think it's hilarious that the OSS crowd really expected their favorite products wouldn't be commercialized. I've never understood why they even thought it was plausible.

    This entire event is the first of many more that will turn OSS OS's into just another Windows. I can already see the "just fork it" comments (and downvotes) but really, you're not going to fork it alone. You'll have to put together a team & at some point they'll want to get paid. Its the way the world works. For better or worse...

    1. Not That Andrew

      Re: Common Sense Coming Home to Roost

      I think you will find not even RMS would deny you the right to earn money from Free Software. What most people are objecting to is the obnoxious and even underhanded way Canonical is doing it in this case

    2. FrankAlphaXII

      Re: Common Sense Coming Home to Roost

      Very true. Thats one of the reasons I personally use Fedora and have for several years. Since its the upstream development version of RHEL for all intents and purposes, there isn't any commercialization creeping in as Red Hat is the commercial version.

      Sure, it takes some tweaking to get to be what I personally call "usable" (a non-free repo for things like the mp3 codec for example), but I know for a fact that every big change thats made isn't going to be like Unity or this Amazon disaster. The more Canonical fucks with Ubuntu, the worse off its users are.

    3. ArmanX

      Re: Common Sense Coming Home to Roost

      I don't mind commercialized, but that's not what this is. A commercialized offer would have a slick, useful tool that people don't want to do without, that just so happens to make some money. This is obviously not that. This is, effectively, a talking banner ad. With built-in spyware. Good job, Canonical. I'm increasingly glad I stayed away from Unity...

    4. MissingSecurity

      Re: Common Sense Coming Home to Roost

      You might want to rethink your OSS crowd expectations, as most are not against commercialism of products, IE Redhat and by extension Ubuntu. It's going to take a whole lot to get to the level of absurdness that is Microsoft. I think most Linux geek saw Ubuntu as the entry level (for Linux for Windows Users) and now can't even bring themselves to recommend it.

      I was one of the Linux for Windows users and well have moved on wouldn't recommend it.

    5. Anonymous Coward
      Meh

      Re: Common Sense Coming Home to Roost

      Well said.

  17. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Switched...

    After using Ubuntu 'stock' for - heck, 8 years now, I'm migrating to several different options depending on task.

    My PVR is now running Xubuntu and my home dev is now running Mint.

    I'm not entirely sure what direction the main Ubuntu desktop branch is heading in - it seems hellbent on thrusting experimental features into each major release.

    I don't want experimental features, I want a desktop that works for me.

    How these features are supposed to attract windows users is beyond me.

    If I were a non-geek windows user presented with Ubuntu 12.10, I'd be fairly clueless exactly where to start.

    Yes, a bit of a pun there - "where's the start menu?"

    "where's microsoft office?"

    "I've downloaded this file and it won't run"

    Ah well, there's always choice.

    1. exanime

      Re: Switched...

      I agree with you... when I moved to Linux I was exclusively with Ubuntu (desktop, server and netbook remix)... now, my server runs it but I am running Kubuntu on my everyday desktop and Lubuntu on my netbook.

      I still like Ubuntu's back end but Unity I just could not pass... specially as they keep on putting this kind of crap on it... I doubt I will ever move to Unity (I did give it a fair 6 month trial when it came out), as a matter of fact, my short term plan is to move my XBMC playback from my Ubuntu headless Server to an Ouya box (if that happens) and once my server is free from GUI requirements I was planing to migrate to Debian (currently I could not run XBMC Eden on Squeeze)... my desktop is now a virtual machine and Kubuntu seems to be a good choice but really anything KDE would be fine by me... finally, my netbook (which is an old-but-refuses-to-die Asus EEEpc) is heading towards Bodhi for the fast speed plus eye candy

      Just to be fair though, 12.10 is technically not a "major" release; only LTS should be considered major...

  18. John Sanders
    Linux

    LMDE + MATE

    Perfect.

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    Search really is awful

    Trying out 12.10 in a VM, wondering why it runs like a pig, I search for "system monitor". I get a row of local applications and the rest of the desktop is covered with adverts for monitors.

    I can't believe that anyone would see this as anything other than a severe irritation and a joke.

    On the plus side, the amazon search is properly blocked if deselected in the privacy settings - nothing is sent back to cannonical or anywhere else.

  20. Simon Brown
    Holmes

    my vote for xubuntu as well

    Have a tiny old Vaio laptop - netbook sized & spec before netbooks existed. Xubuntu is good as gold. Also run it dual boot on my i7 pc with an ssd in and strangely isn't THAT much faster on the pc... or maybe it just isn't that much slower on the laptop...

  21. This post has been deleted by its author

  22. Mephistro
    Linux

    Just two questions...

    Isn't there a way to remove the nagware? I'm still using the 12.04 so I can't test it myself without lots of work and hard drive real state that I happen to lack at the moment, and, to be frank, I'm a lazy f**k. If there is an easy and straightforward method to remove the Lens and substitute the find-as-you-type feature in the OS, it's just a little bit more of work when installing the OS. I only hope it's not one of these slippery slope things, and that in the future we won't need to decrapify Ubuntu installs the same way we have to decrapify machines with preinstalled Windows.

    If the answer to this question is something like "No, the nagware can't be removed' or 'It can be removed but with lots of effort', then I suggest Canonical to stuff their Quantal Quetzal where the Sun doesn't shine. Preferably in flames.

    And my second question is: Is the Quetzal dead or alive? :-D

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    ubuntu rip

    Last week I installed Ubuntu 12.10 on my Dell desktop after an absence of 4 years from Ubuntu.

    All my admin/system menus have disappeared.

    I tried to install kde - convoluted instructions which crashed my machine and needed a complete re-install.

    I upgraded my machine from 2G to 4G ram. Ubuntu only recognized 3G. I had to patch the kernel to fix it.

    Tried to install PlayForLinux. It crashed.

    Tried to install Spotify. Native version had audio problems after I upgraded audio drivers. Windows version under Wine caused audio to be intermittent.

    Installed Eclipse. Java kept crashing.

    Playback of 1080p through Chrome is stuttery - despite plenty of memory, big graphics card, 1TB of disk and dual cpu not being stressed.

    After having suffered through years of crap OSX memory management, and constant Windows bloat I thought Ubuntu could be the answer. My experience 4 years ago was generally good. Now it's no better than the rest.

    1. Vic

      Re: ubuntu rip

      > Ubuntu only recognized 3G. I had to patch the kernel to fix it.

      I don't believe you.

      To recognise 4GB on a 32-bit kernel, you just need the PAE extensions. If you'd installed 12.10 (as you claim), you've got them by default.

      If you install an earlier version, you don't need to patch anything - just install the PAE kernel. That's a selection in the package manager, just like any other software.

      Ubuntu has many problems, and 12.10 really isn't great, but making up shit that's easily disproved doesn't actually help anyone.

      Vic.

      1. Captain TickTock
        Boffin

        Re: ubuntu rip

        > Ubuntu only recognized 3G. I had to patch the kernel to fix it.

        You can't have installed the 64bit version, then

    2. ArmanX

      Re: ubuntu rip

      While I can understand some of your problems, I think a few of them aren't actually Ubuntu's fault. PlayOnLinux has had some problems recently; use the latest version from their own PPA to get around that. Spotify may have the same problem; I've never used it. Installing KDE shouldn't be hard - "apt-get install kubuntu" and you're done. And Java... well, java crashes. It's pretty good at that. For video and sound problems, make sure you're using the right drivers; for video, nVidia proprietary drivers work better than the open source ones. ATI and Intel cards may or may not work, depending.

      My suggestion? Debian. Ubuntu came from Debian roots, and if you're used to that, then Debian is the way to go. If you really want to stick with Ubuntu, then use the latest LTS. In my experience, LTS tends to be the most stable. The release after the LTS is usually the most buggy - all the projects that didn't finish in time for the LTS are thrown in there.

  24. Escapee from TalkTalk

    Unity is "working out"???

    Interesting comment, given that Unity caused enough users to jump ship to send Ubuntu to third place in distrowatch (down from a very comfortable first). It also seems to mark the point at which they decided "to hell with what our users want" and started losing the plot completely

  25. Martin
    FAIL

    You know what really pisses me off about this?

    Slightly off topic, but bear with me....

    It seems now that with the new Amazon Cloud Player, linux on the desktop is no longer properly supported. For the last five years, I have been able to buy an mp3 album and download it to my PC, and it appears in the right place, properly organized. Now, I buy an mp3 album, it appears in the Cloud Player, and I can only download it one track at a time into my Downloads directory. Really bloody helpful.

    SO...on the one hand, Amazon have decided to shaft Linux desktop users after five years of support.

    On the other hand, Ubuntu is cozying up to Amazon.

    Well, Canonical - I suggest you get onto Amazon and complain bitterly on behalf of your twenty million users - you now have some clout with them.

    But I'm not going to hold my breath waiting.

  26. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Yawn

    And other day, another Linux failure. Is it anyone wonder this menagerie of amateurish clones are a running joke?

    1. James Hughes 1

      Re: Yawn

      Failure? Really?

      Most Ubuntu users probably won't give a damn. They will either use the new lens stuff or disable it, meanwhile they get a modern desktop, and lots of worthwhile bugs fixes and improvements. Seems to me that the minority people who don't like Unity and some of its features, are spoiling the park for Ubuntu . Most people get on with it fine, but all this negativity from people who don't like it (and fair enough, if you don't, you don't - but Iwould recommend persevering) will stop fresh people from using it - and tbh, there's not that much wrong with it - for the average consumer it's easy to use, and provides every feature they will ever need. More high powered users? Probably 90% of those are also suitably handled.

      Linux needs someone like Shuttleworth/Canonical, otherwise it will remain in the minority. Even if some of their decisions seem counter productive, at least they are making them, and shaking things up a bit, and providing some of the professionalism required for a mass market OS.

      1. Captain TickTock

        Re: Yawn

        don't feed the troll...

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        @James Hughes 1 - Re: Yawn

        Bravo! Man, you're so good at PR speaking! I wish my grand-mother were here to hear your inspiring words!

        On a totally unrelated matter, can you tell us if Ubuntu will still be sending our search info to Amazon even if we disable the damn thing ?

        And in the end, just between you and me, Linux does not need anyone because it is doing just fine for the rest of us.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Yawn

      Yeah, you're really tired. Now go to sleep, this will help you grow up.

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Not entirely Canonicals fault...

    Amazon is absolutely horrible on some search terms. Diabolical on others. If Canonical are simply feeding back to the desktop what Amazon are feeding back to them, it is no wonder that the search results are absolute crap.

  28. BitDr
    FAIL

    Kicked them to the curb long ago...

    I actively discourage UBUNTU to those leaving Windows as my experience with other converts has shown that the Unity Interface drives them quite mad. Fedora is out of the picture because of Gnome 3 (same kind of insanity).

    For me, just thinking of using either Unity or the Gnome 3 shell interface as a work environment sets my teeth on edge. I do keep tabs on developments in both to see if sanity is returning to the development teams, as yet there is no reason to be optimistic.

    1. Captain TickTock
      Happy

      Re: Kicked them to the curb long ago...

      I upgraded to 11.10 a bit too soon, and Unity wasn;'t really ready, the Gnome2-ish fallback wasn't so hot.

      Gnome3 had buggy graphics (in Ubuntu at least, but not in the Fedora live CD I had, where it looked som much cleaner than Unity) so it wasn't usable unless I jumped distro. I wasn't going to spend the time doing that, or rewinding, so I put up with it, and waited a bit longer before upgrading my desktop to 12.04, where Unity was more polished, and I got used to it. Having seen Karen Sandler's keynote at linux conf 2012(mentioned here http://forums.theregister.co.uk/forum/1/2012/10/17/pacemakers_open_to_wireless_attack/ well worth a watch) I decided to give Gnome3 another try, and I have to say I like how it's coming on, and it suits me fine.

      I'll be waiting a good few months before moving up to 12.10, though.

  29. GotThumbs
    Boffin

    The start of a dying OS?

    This kind of forced injection against the wishes of its users, is THE opportunity other Linux based distros have been waiting for and can take full advantage of.

    Ubuntu users are NOT novices or the general public. They ARE quite capable of backing up their data, wiping the OS drive and installing a completely different OS. There are other choices available.

    Makes you wonder who the Twit is that thought this would be a welcomed feature. Must have been a bean counter. Well the person who decided to implement the idea should be fired today.

    1. keithpeter Silver badge
      Childcatcher

      Re: The start of a dying OS?

      "Makes you wonder who the Twit is that thought this would be a welcomed feature. Must have been a bean counter. Well the person who decided to implement the idea should be fired today."

      Er - as this 'feature' came in after the interface freeze, and to the apparent (not sure about that) bemusement of Jeremy Bicha, I suspect it was the sabdfl himself. Sacking could prove difficult...

    2. This post has been deleted by its author

  30. Archimedes_Circle
    Big Brother

    solution

    sudo apt-get remove unity-lens-shopping. Sorted, though I haven't decided to take the plunge to Ubuntu 12.10

  31. I Am Spartacus
    Mushroom

    THANK YOU Mr Shutlleworth

    Thank you for putting the Amazon search in to 12.10. Oh and thank you for the fantastic update process. No, seriously, thank you very deeply. This was a fantastic idea.

    Based on the fact that I didn't really want the Amazon feature and its creeping commercialisation of Ubuntu, I put a copy of Lubuntu on a pen drive to test. It seemed ok, but was I really ready to move away?

    Well, this morning I decided to upgrade my 12.04 version to 12.10. It failed. It failed quite spectacularly and left me with "Grub load error - file not found... Grub> " Oh dear. No help. No commands to enter. Oh, and now no way to get to the Internet and check. Yes, you need to load a browser for that and that means loading an OS.

    Oh well, in for a penny, lets install LUbuntu.

    Oh, my. This is nice. It clean. No clutter. Fast. And it works the way I really want it to. It supports both my screens properly (Unity NEVER did that). This is what I want my computer to look like.

    So, thank you once again. If you hadn't have put the Amazon thingy in to Unity and recreated Microsofts Active Desktop I would not have tried LUbuntu.

  32. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Sorry, too late Mr Shuttleworth, already warming to Linux Mint. I used and thoroughly enjoyed Ubuntu since v8 but all good things must come to an end. I don't agree with your hooking up with Amazon, sure I appreciate all that work needs to be paid for but no thanks. I wish you all the very best and so long!

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