Ubuntu 17.10 Final Beta Is Ready For Testing(phoronix.com)
phoronix.com
Ubuntu 17.10 Final Beta Is Ready For Testing
https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Ubuntu-17.10-Final-Beta
11 comments
The underlying issue is CADT churn in the userland.
Every few years or so some new "kid" comes onboard and decides they can rewrite some piece of code over a caffeine fueled weekend.
This then effectively solves some surface problems but resets the clock on a whole lot of other issues...
Every few years or so some new "kid" comes onboard and decides they can rewrite some piece of code over a caffeine fueled weekend.
This then effectively solves some surface problems but resets the clock on a whole lot of other issues...
I never heard of that acronym, CADT, so I had to look it up. For the curious, it stands for "Cascade of Attention-Deficit Teenagers" model.[1] And that exact scenario... wow. I've run into it before and have taken the effort to retest and revalidate some bugs for reopening. I thought I was just unlucky with how many such bugs affected me, but I guess I wasn't alone.
[1] https://www.jwz.org/doc/cadt.html
[1] https://www.jwz.org/doc/cadt.html
I would advice against linking that. JWZ do not like HN much, so he has set his site to refer-filter every incoming connection to a less than pleasant image on imgur...
Yes, blame everything on the young. That isn't biased at all.
And the fact young people are more likely to be People of Color due to demographic shifts isn't a factor at all, I'm sure.
And the fact young people are more likely to be People of Color due to demographic shifts isn't a factor at all, I'm sure.
Would you please stop posting this kind of comment to Hacker News? It breaks the HN guidelines, specifically this one:
"Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize."
Also this one:
"Assume good faith." (<-- Edit: whoops, haven't added that one yet! It's coming.)
Blatant nastiness is easier to do something about because it's so obvious. But when people degrade discussion by replying to the worst about each other, the frog boils more subtly.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
"Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize."
Also this one:
"Assume good faith." (<-- Edit: whoops, haven't added that one yet! It's coming.)
Blatant nastiness is easier to do something about because it's so obvious. But when people degrade discussion by replying to the worst about each other, the frog boils more subtly.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
Would you please moderate hateful and bigoted statements on HN, then?
Oh, good Lord.
I am absolutely sick of it. And I left.
Broken bluetooth headphone pairing due to some idiotic "patches" Ubuntu "maintain" as part of their "mobile" efforts.
Untold wasted hours on custom desktop environments, X11 replacements, "mobile"- all abandoned or half-assed.
Broken upgrade from 16.04 to 16.10 that left my network inoperable.
Half-assed systemd integration - why do I have two competing networking services on my computer ????
Ubuntu is a ghetto. A "we-are-all-super-friendly-united-in-harmony-giant-human-family-everything-is-amazing" ghetto of too much advertising, too much PR, too much "community" this-and-that and not nearly enough engineering.
This is what happens when you have a billionaire benefactor, too much free time, and no fear of failure - lack of direction, lack of vision, lack of anything of quality, really.
Broken bluetooth headphone pairing due to some idiotic "patches" Ubuntu "maintain" as part of their "mobile" efforts.
Untold wasted hours on custom desktop environments, X11 replacements, "mobile"- all abandoned or half-assed.
Broken upgrade from 16.04 to 16.10 that left my network inoperable.
Half-assed systemd integration - why do I have two competing networking services on my computer ????
Ubuntu is a ghetto. A "we-are-all-super-friendly-united-in-harmony-giant-human-family-everything-is-amazing" ghetto of too much advertising, too much PR, too much "community" this-and-that and not nearly enough engineering.
This is what happens when you have a billionaire benefactor, too much free time, and no fear of failure - lack of direction, lack of vision, lack of anything of quality, really.
Interested to know what other Linux you moved to (if it was Linux, and not, say MacOS or Windows). Asking because I've had various issues with it too. Considering Linux Mint or Arch.
Ubuntu is for noobs, try openSUSE with KDE. If you can't be happy with that you should run Gentoo - that's fun too...
Fedora is ok for me. At least they're moving forward, never sideways or back.
Community maintained variants like xubuntu rely entirely on volunteers, so you can make a big difference if you can test things & report bugs during the prerelease versions.
> Ubuntu is great, but maybe the priority should be flawless instead of yet another window manager/desktop environment.
Well switching to Systemd, Gnome Shell and Wayland instead of their own solutions goes a long way towards freeing up their resources to make that experience flawless.
Well switching to Systemd, Gnome Shell and Wayland instead of their own solutions goes a long way towards freeing up their resources to make that experience flawless.
They will now stop maintaining their own DE (Unity) to rely on Gnome instead. So in a way they'll be spending less resources on window manager/desktop environment.
Also Linux on the desktop went a long way since I started using it 20 years ago, but it's always a catch-up play with new hardware specs.
Also Linux on the desktop went a long way since I started using it 20 years ago, but it's always a catch-up play with new hardware specs.
I doubt they will be taking resources from the default Gnome desktop to attend to XFCE issues: Xubuntu = Ubuntu + XFCE, which I believe is not formally supported by Canonical similar to Kubuntu (KDE)
10+ years full time Ubuntu user here, I have to say that although I am happy for the fact that Unity is gone, it is too late as I have moved to xfce4.
The decision to move to Unity was bad, users choose Linux desktop because they want something simple, something more under their control. The whole unity desktop experience together with that everything is searchable promise is just not the right selling point for that audience.
Now many many years in xfce4, that is the exact desktop environment I want. no over engineering rubbish, no forced features, no fancy UI pretending to be cool/smart, just the essential stuff that actually work. If I am going to spend most of time in terminals + chrome, why forcing me to have a fat desktop environment? gnome seems to be fine, used it for many many years before the Unity joke/xfce4, but it is still too fat and it is too late.
The decision to move to Unity was bad, users choose Linux desktop because they want something simple, something more under their control. The whole unity desktop experience together with that everything is searchable promise is just not the right selling point for that audience.
Now many many years in xfce4, that is the exact desktop environment I want. no over engineering rubbish, no forced features, no fancy UI pretending to be cool/smart, just the essential stuff that actually work. If I am going to spend most of time in terminals + chrome, why forcing me to have a fat desktop environment? gnome seems to be fine, used it for many many years before the Unity joke/xfce4, but it is still too fat and it is too late.
Unity was never there to stop you using xfce4, so I'm not sure why removing it is 'too late'. Xubuntu predated Unity by several years. The various desktop flavours are alternatives, not competing forks, even if the one you prefer isn't the default. One of the reasons Ubuntu succeeded is that it supported both Gnome and KDE, even if Gnome happened to be the default, and Xubuntu brought even more users.
This is exciting! Coincidentally I have been messing with 17.10 the past few days, and I think it'll solve my display issues with a 3 monitor setup (with one 4k in the middle). That means I can finally be done with SSHing into a linux VM from windows when I want to do development on my gaming PC :)
What sort of issues were you having?
I haven't kept up with the goings-on in this release, but I was quite excited to see so many clamoring for resolutions to pains involving multi-monitor setups in a previous discussion[1]. I would be interested to see what of those pains have been fixed.
1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14002821
I haven't kept up with the goings-on in this release, but I was quite excited to see so many clamoring for resolutions to pains involving multi-monitor setups in a previous discussion[1]. I would be interested to see what of those pains have been fixed.
1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14002821
I understand that you can't demand the same things from a non-profit ecosystem like Linux like you can from Windows or MacOS, but that being said the lack of good support for multiple monitor setups is infuriating. I've tried to get a "Laptop HTPC" setup working several times and it always takes a bunch of ugly hacks to even make it usable -- and you can forget about doing any of it in any kind of GUI, most of the time that will even make things worse.
multiple monitor support? you mean like 6-8 monitors? or just 2-3? I have been using ubuntu for 2-3 monitors setup for 10 years, never had any real problem.
X11 has supported multiple monitors for 30 years
Yes, it supports multiple monitors in limitless arbitrary positions. If you want a monitor to the right hand side, one mounted behind you and one above you then you can configure this.
However if you want three monitors lined up side by side, this seems to be ridiculously hard to configure at least in Ubuntu. The monitor drag-drop interface in Ubuntu is the worst I have ever seen. We recently had three new hires and had to go through the traumatic experience of setting this up for each of them.
However if you want three monitors lined up side by side, this seems to be ridiculously hard to configure at least in Ubuntu. The monitor drag-drop interface in Ubuntu is the worst I have ever seen. We recently had three new hires and had to go through the traumatic experience of setting this up for each of them.
Sadly Gnome is a confounding variable in all this.
They have decided that they will only do whole number scaling, and Unity (up to 7, Unity 8, now a community project, was to be based on Qt) is based on GTK/Gnome.
Frankly the Linux DE have been crapifying every size the DEs (Gnome in particular) figured they knew better how to do the underlying stuff than X11.
They have decided that they will only do whole number scaling, and Unity (up to 7, Unity 8, now a community project, was to be based on Qt) is based on GTK/Gnome.
Frankly the Linux DE have been crapifying every size the DEs (Gnome in particular) figured they knew better how to do the underlying stuff than X11.
man xrandr
To expand on this, you can easily do something like:
xranrdr -d :0 --output VGA-2 --right-of VGA-1
xranrdr -d :0 --output VGA-3 --right-of VGA-2
That would line up your three monitors in a row. I've been using it to automate testing of a multi-window Electron app and it works very well. You can do grids, columns, a cross - whatever...
xranrdr -d :0 --output VGA-2 --right-of VGA-1
xranrdr -d :0 --output VGA-3 --right-of VGA-2
That would line up your three monitors in a row. I've been using it to automate testing of a multi-window Electron app and it works very well. You can do grids, columns, a cross - whatever...
Extension for using multiple monitors as one big monitor, Xinerama, came out in 1998.
If I plug a display into my laptop, the screen switches over but everything is scaled wrong and glitchy. When I remove it... it never brings my original display back--essentially bricking it.
::sigh::
I've never once had a problem like that in Windows and I literally switch my display back-and-forth in Windows 7 at least 3 times a day as I move around.
::sigh::
I've never once had a problem like that in Windows and I literally switch my display back-and-forth in Windows 7 at least 3 times a day as I move around.
Are you running a X session or Wayland?
For those attached to Unity, the (Ubuntu) Mate desktop now contains a panel layout called "Mutiny", it very much like Unity. Turn on Compiz for window management and you will almost feel like nothing has changed... Almost...
I am curious, what is the unique selling point of Unity which makes people stick to it? Is it a global menu[1]? Dock? Support of legacy indicators?
[1]: GNOME3 has command pallete (ctrl+p) known from Sublime Text - https://github.com/p-e-w/plotinus
edit: Also https://github.com/lestcape/Gnome-Global-AppMenu
[1]: GNOME3 has command pallete (ctrl+p) known from Sublime Text - https://github.com/p-e-w/plotinus
edit: Also https://github.com/lestcape/Gnome-Global-AppMenu
For me, it is possibly the menu/dock aspect, but for whatever reason it grew on me. I personally don't like the (Windows here) "click start -> hover applications -> drill down" method.
In the grand scheme of things, it is really just a taskbar in a vertical orientation, but I dunno, I just liked it after a while.
I understand the motivation of getting rid of it (the dislike of it from a lot of the user base, the development needs being able to be applied elsewhere, etc.) so I'm not going crazy over it or anything. Will miss it though.
In the grand scheme of things, it is really just a taskbar in a vertical orientation, but I dunno, I just liked it after a while.
I understand the motivation of getting rid of it (the dislike of it from a lot of the user base, the development needs being able to be applied elsewhere, etc.) so I'm not going crazy over it or anything. Will miss it though.
It hasn't been necessary to drill down the applications in the start menu since windows 7. Just start, type search, enter. Then pin your frequent apps to the task bar.
Not necessary, but I'd argue it was still the predominant method for 7 and even 8 (from what I've seen people use, anyway). I do find myself personally with 10 using search a lot more (haven't had to observe others, so no idea about others usage), but sometimes I've had to shift over to the Win10 equivalent of the start menu -> applications method if I can't remember the name of the application outright (this was a bigger problem for me prior to Curse becoming part of Twitch, admittedly. They had two different clients and one of them was a bit more vague in naming).
I was more alluding to the gnome method which last I used it has a similar menu with the tiered folder structure. Maybe they have added search as well, but my memory of GNOME is too fuzzy so I had to go with the fresher (for me) Windows equivalent (granted, with Windows 10 the applications folder essentially hangs out to the left of the Windows 8 start screen-esque area so calling it Applications folder would be a misnomer on my part).
I was more alluding to the gnome method which last I used it has a similar menu with the tiered folder structure. Maybe they have added search as well, but my memory of GNOME is too fuzzy so I had to go with the fresher (for me) Windows equivalent (granted, with Windows 10 the applications folder essentially hangs out to the left of the Windows 8 start screen-esque area so calling it Applications folder would be a misnomer on my part).
Unity is elegant and simple, yet offers all the functionality I need, has a minimal UI and keyboard shortcuts for everything.
Gnome3 is a collection of UI blunders and they (over)spend their funding on political bullshit I don't support.
Gnome3 is a collection of UI blunders and they (over)spend their funding on political bullshit I don't support.
reference?
It just works™. Plain simple window manager with good defaults.
Since 1995 I have tried every major window manager, nowadays I just use the default installations in any OS I use.
Since 1995 I have tried every major window manager, nowadays I just use the default installations in any OS I use.
When you have an application maximized, its title bar becomes one with the status bar ( the one with time, network, weather and other indicators)
I think people initially didn't like it because it was canonical's attempt at "convergence" so that ubuntu could be used on PC/phone/tablet back when their plan was to run on those things. A lot of people hate the idea of a desktop OS that looks like a tablet OS. Anyway, I agree, over time I got used to it and don't really mind it now, certainly better than the old gnome 2 menu based desktop.
I believe that the Ubuntu Gnome Shell will have an extension to give it a Unity-like look, see the series of blog posts here: https://didrocks.fr/
No global menu though.
Yeah, Python 3.6 is the default 3.x! Been waiting for that for years.
That is already the case on 16.04 afaik, perhaps even earlier.
No, you’ve been able to install it along side 3.5 for a while, but not as python3. I’m on zesty now with 2.7, 3.5, and 3.6.
How’s the GNOME experience on Ubuntu?
IMO it is great. The Ubuntu dock is an improvement, also Ubuntu Gnome will support old style tray icons out of the box. Canonical is making Gnome more usable and attractive to an average user. They are fixing mistakes that Gnome developers are making. Of course that is subjective and controversial opinion, but it seems like Gnome developers are removing useful features and adding useless apps like gnome-recipes instead.
Unfortunately, real fractional scaling did not make it to this release (you can test it though). I can't wait for 18.04 which will probably have fractional scaling and will be an LTS release.
Unfortunately, real fractional scaling did not make it to this release (you can test it though). I can't wait for 18.04 which will probably have fractional scaling and will be an LTS release.
As a Unity fan, the way GNOME's setup now allows me to keep pretty much my entire workflow as I was used to it.
> usable and attractive to an average user.
I think you nailed it there, Ubuntu is a least common denominator of the Linux distros. Canonical found their niche, good for them.
I think you nailed it there, Ubuntu is a least common denominator of the Linux distros. Canonical found their niche, good for them.
You still need to visit Gnome Extensions website and get some extra elements to improve your experience. But in general, out of the box GNOME is clean, easy to use and intuitive.
Yup, but it's so easy to install extensions. On Fedora, all I've added is a weather applet, caffeine (disables auto suspend/screensaver when enabled), and a permanent dock on the left side. A few switches on an easy to navigate website and I feel my desktop is perfect.
I like the one that makes the top bar transparent. The weather applet is a must, as well as the battery time left indicator.
I use the following extensions:
- https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/921/multi-monitors-ad...
- https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/15/alternatetab/
- https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/921/multi-monitors-ad...
- https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/15/alternatetab/
I've been using the Ubuntu GNOME version for years and it has been pretty rock solid and I've had no complaints.
The biggest problem I have with GNOME is how boring it is... It's not a bad thing, don't get me wrong, but I wish it would be a bit more interesting, especially if I have to use it 10+ hours a day.
Heh, you get to see your desktop? I've usually got so much up that I can't see it. I like boring XFCE for that reason.
That is a strange remark, what do mean specifically? Perhaps there is still something like X snow? Or can you have the desktops on a cube with reflections at the bottom and fish inside like in de beryl days??
Otherwise, roaming the KDE settings can be a fun excercise.
Otherwise, roaming the KDE settings can be a fun excercise.
I have disliked the default Gnome experience for a long time but really like the new Ubuntu Gnome experience.
Should one be able to upgrade to 17.10 stable when it's out (without too much trouble), or are you stuck in beta “ring” if you install this?
It will upgrade to stable 17.10.
To expand on that, there is no “beta“ channel, just a channel per release. If you install 17.10 beta, you‘ll get 17.10 package updates until the day of release, at which point you have the set of package versions that are considered the „stable“ release. After that, the 17.10 channel gets post-release bug and security fixes only.
My understanding is that there's an upgrade path just an do-release-upgrade away. I'm semi sure I've upgraded from beta to stable a few times.
What is going to happen to my Ubuntu GNOME desktop when I upgrade? Is it going to stay vanilla or will I have the Ubuntu-ified version of GNOME available in GDM?
You can install gnome-session package. In GDM you will be able to choose between "Ubuntu Session" (Ubuntified Gnome) and "Gnome Session" (vanilla).
I just upgraded from Ubuntu GNOME 17.04 via "sudo do-release-upgrade -d" and everything still looks like it did before. After a reboot, the login screen has the purple Ubuntu Unity look and then it switches to the Ubuntu GNOME look.
As I understand it, the version of Gnome they're shipping is vanilla Gnome with a few extensions enabled by default, all of which can be disabled using Gnome Tweak. There's no need for a separate session.
I am wondering too. There is even no Ubuntu GNOME on the update list. Is it going to be discontinued?
Yes Ubuntu GNOME will be discontinued as determined by the developers. They decided it was better time to contribute to making Gnome better in the Ubuntu distribution itself. There will an additional package you can install to enable standard GNOME configuration.
This might be a little off-topic, but anyone knows whether gentoo's USE flags will come to debian derivatives?
Probably not, gentoo compiles everything, building deb packages for every possible combination of flags would be almost impossible, and if you add the fact that you can change the flags for a single package then you will get something impossible to do.
USE flags and equivalents are a thing that only comes with systems that compile most of the software instead of relying in binaries.
USE flags and equivalents are a thing that only comes with systems that compile most of the software instead of relying in binaries.
I don't want debian to compile every combination of use flags. I just want to be able to opt-in to use softwares compiled and optimized by me.
DEB_BUILD _OPTIONS was already a thing. There is now also more formal build profiles feature. (https://wiki.debian.org/BuildProfileSpec)
this is closest you'll get though, as Debian is not a source distribution and these features are not aimed at users
this is closest you'll get though, as Debian is not a source distribution and these features are not aimed at users
I wish Gnome would adopt the Dolphin file manager...
Or we could perhaps abandon the notion of DEs and let people assemble the tools they want to use for themselves...
The number of people who want to do that, that are not doing so now, is approximately the population of Cheyenne, Wyoming.
Apple is nearly a trillion dollar company. People want cloud backup, consistent and beautiful UI, and usable, "just works" tools. They're doing something correctly.
Sincerely,
Someone who owns a Windows PC, an Ubuntu laptop, a Fedora server, an Android personal phone, and an iPhone work phone.
Apple is nearly a trillion dollar company. People want cloud backup, consistent and beautiful UI, and usable, "just works" tools. They're doing something correctly.
Sincerely,
Someone who owns a Windows PC, an Ubuntu laptop, a Fedora server, an Android personal phone, and an iPhone work phone.
Apple didn't sell much until they could halo ipod and iphone. And even then what really got ipod etc rolling was itunes and itms for Windows.
Beyond that what sold OSX better was a unix cli in a off the shelf hardware package with a support contract.
And frankly what people want can be so easily manipulated by marketing that is a real worry.
Beyond that what sold OSX better was a unix cli in a off the shelf hardware package with a support contract.
And frankly what people want can be so easily manipulated by marketing that is a real worry.
[deleted]
For example now my volume control uses 5 steps at once instead of one. So every version I have to search the net for some command line command to fix things.
I wont leave Linux anytime soon but I can imagine people get sick of this.
Ubuntu is great, but maybe the priority should be flawless instead of yet another window manager/desktop environment.