Visit this article for an overview about the new development in commercial operating systems. The article focuses on Windows, but the same applies to Mac OS X. I like the fact that it makes Linux a principle choice, not only a cheap one.
Right now we’re all happy with our Jaunty Jackalope, but we need to keep looking forward. The release of Karmic Koala (9.10) is scheduled for October this year. It’s planned to have the following features:
An interesting release to look forward to.
Check the release schedule at Ubuntu.
Ubuntu 9.04 has been released yesterday and of course I installed it immediately. I’ve been running the 9.04 release since the alphas, but the Ubuntu tradition is that the release is much better then the pre-releases.
Installation
For the installation I decided to use a separate boot partition which should make it more easy to have multiple systems on my laptop. I’ve tried this two times, but sadly this resulted in a kernel panic telling me something about a failed synchronization. So I skipped the boot partition setup and installed the boot files on the system partition. That worked just fine.
The installation itself is smooth and easy to understand. The most improved part is the timezone selection, that works fine now opposed to the crappy version in 8.10.
Updates
After installation I did my usual updates:
All of those worked fine, for some of them I had to update the software sources, but that was no problem.
Then I went into my usual tweaking: themes. I’m now running the Dust theme which is delivered with Ubuntu these days. It’s a nice quiet theme that requires little screenspace.
NTP
After the visual stuff had been taken care of I ended up with a problem I always had with Ubuntu: installing the NTP time service. Somehow I never can get it to work from the Time and Date admin panel. It always crashes for a while and after a couple of tries it works. A strange bug that has been around for a while now.
Up and running
Now the system is working and all my stuff is installed again (1.5 hours after starting the install), I’m playing with it. It’s fast, the ext4 filesystem seems to make the system more responsive. Starting OpenOffice’s word processor takes a while the first time, but it’s lightning fast the second. Everything in the system feels snappy and robust.
On the functional level nothing really changed from 8.10. The system is nearly the same as 8.10. Of course OpenOffice has been updated to 3.0, but I had that version running on 8.10 for ages already. Brasero has been added, nice, but I don’t burn CDs anymore. When I look at the work I do with my laptop the 9.04 is exactly the same as 8.10.
The new boot splash and the notifications are nice, but they are not a major upgrade. They add to the overall robust feel of the system, however.
Evolution and Exchange 2007
My personal frustration, using Evolution with Exchange 2007, still hasn’t been solved. You can install the evolution-mape package from synaptic now, but it doesn’t work for me. The configuration is sloppy and difficult to understand and from what I’ve read it still doesn’t provide all functionality. That means that I’m still required to run Windows XP in VirtualBox. Too bad.
Conclusion
I knew that 9.04 was not going to be a major step forward. Ubuntu has always taken a evolutionary approach to their development. The system is faster and more stable then 8.10, but it’s not a major step. I must admit that I expect a bigger improvement from being able to use Chrome on Linux then from upgrading to Ubuntu 9.10.
So, what’s new? Nothing much really. Stuff has been changed under the hood, but the end user will not really notice that. It’s still a stable and modern system, but I think some real inovation would really help to make Ubuntu more widely used.
Tomorrow the beta of Ubuntu 9.04 should be released. The alphas have been great, so I’m really looking forward to the beta. I wonder if they got the last little hickups out of the alpha and will deliver the usual quality that we’re used to.
Actually I’ve had very little problems with the alpha so far. I run it as a dual boot next to my stable 8.10 and start it every now and then to play with it. I found so little bugs that I’m wondering if anything has changed since 8.10. But obviously it has, it’s much faster and runs so much smoother then 8.10.
The only real problem I’ve encountered was a total freeze at random moments. That sounds severe, but I’m sure this will be fixed in the final release. The hardware support is great, I didn’t have to tweak anything to make it work on my Sony Vaio TZ21MN.
There are a few challenges that are not directly linked to the 9.04 release. Compiz still doesn’t support a desktop larger then 2048×2048, annoying since I usually connect a second monitor to my machine which brings my desktop to a width of 3414 px. Too bad, but I can live with Metacity and it’s composite settings.
Entourage finally supports the MAPI connect to Exchange. A challenge is that at our company we’re using a SSL connection to get to Exchange, this makes sense but the latest release of the MAPI connector doesn’t support it. Shame, I would have loved to drop my Windows XP in a VirtualBox that only runs Outlook.
Ah well, I’ll wait a bit more until these issues are also fixed. Until then I’ll keep using the most stable, fast and feature rich operating system there is.
There is a repository that contains the daily build of Chromium. It’s easy to add: no building required! For details you can look at the PPA page.
The only thing that took me some time was the PGP file. I’ve created a file for your convenience.
Open Software Sources and add the key in the authentication tab. Then add the following to the Third Party Software tab. Click close and reload.
deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/chromium-daily/ppa/ubuntu intrepid main deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/chromium-daily/ppa/ubuntu intrepid main
The browser is FAST, but it’s not 100% stable. You can play with it, but at this moment it won’t replace Firefox.
The people from Gnome Global Menu have made their installation more convenient then it was before. No more compilation required, just add the repo to your software sources.
Gnome Global Menu gives you a menu bar for the active application in a gnome panel like Mac OS X has it. This saves you some vertical screen space since the menu is removed from the application window.
It works fine, but only for GTK applications. That doesn’t sound so bad, but my main applications, firefox and openoffice, are not genuine GTK applications. This means that their menu is still shown in the application window itself. Too bad.
A clear description of the installation is on the project install page. The only flaw on there is that you need to import the GPG key before you reload the repository list.
After the installation you need to add the global menu applet toyour gnome panel and right click it to open the preferences. There you can enable the global menu.
I’ve been having problems with the wifi reception in my apartment for a long time. As usual I started looking for solutions in the software direction: installing some linux on the router and pushing up the wifi signal with that. However, I never thought about a hardware solution. There is a very easy solution that is so simple I would never think of it: create a parabolic mirror.
After some searching I found a little movie on Youtube that explains how to make one with aluminum foil and some cardboard. The mentioned diagram can be found here.
[Update March 10, 2009]
The alpha 5 of Ubuntu 9.04 Jaunty Jackalope has been released. I’ve installed it on my Sony TZ laptop for a little test drive.
Downloading went very smooth, it looks like Canonical has added some servers for the alpha downloads. When I started the live CD it worked as we’re used to. From the boot I went straight into to the installation. I read that there were some issues with the partitioner, but it gave me no problems at all.
Booting into the freshly installed Ubuntu I was confronted with a layout which is very similar to 8.10. I found the 
only visible difference after connecting to the wireless network: the new notification system. It shows nice, half transparent, notifications in the upper right corner of the screen. Strangely they fall over the top Gnome panel, I couldn’t find out if that is meant to be or a bug. A little alpha bug: the contents of the notification window showed a couple of times and then died. When I change the volume or the brightness I only see a black filled rectangle.
There are hardly any changes in the preferences panels. But the system itself works great. It boots fast, works very smooth when started. Compiz performs good, nothing special, but that’s good enough. This release feels like an update of the ‘bottom’ of the system: everything works smooth and fast, but there are no obvious changes.
Overall I’m looking forward to April when the final will be released.
The name for Ubuntu 9.10 has been revealed: Karmic Koala.Now, I’m fond of koalas, but what kind of name is that? Ah well, Ubuntu holds its ‘weird name’ status.
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