A Look Back At The Desktop & X.Org/Wayland/Mir Milestones Of Ubuntu

[phoronix]

Phoronix: A Look Back At The Desktop & X.Org/Wayland/Mir Milestones Of Ubuntu

With Unity 8 (and Mir) being years behind schedule, Mark Shuttleworth today made the surprise announcement of abandoning Unity 8 and shifting back to GNOME while also stopping their Ubuntu Phone efforts. This was the biggest Ubuntu shock in years and as such I've thrown together today a bit of a memorial or look back at the various desktop milestones of Ubuntu since its first release covered by Phoronix back in 2004. Check it out if you are a relatively new Linux user or just wish to relive the old screenshots of GNOME2, Ubuntu Netbook Remix, Ubuntu TV, the early Unity days, the ambitious Mir plans, and more.

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=24483

[labyrinth153]

Ubuntu could have been "Linux for human beings" but instead chose to be Linux for greed. Didn't work did it. Thanks for wasting years of my life.

[dungeon]

After changed color Mint took them over at distrowatch

[Swiftpaw]

After changed color Mint took them over at distrowatch

Ha, so they did. I liked Unity OK, but since you can make Gnome 3 like Unity, and Gnome 3 can be an interface for touch screens and smaller devices too, it is a waste reinventing that wheel.

[dungeon]

That was all before Gnome 3 and Unity, Immidiately when they changed human skin colors to something else it get down

No human's pigment color, no success

[muncrief]

I sincerely don't wish to offend those who like Unity, but never once in any of my experiences trying to get people to switch to Linux did anyone like it. In fact most people didn't even like the modern Gnome desktop.

Unfortunately it appears that when Microsoft came out with the ungainly Windows 8 and 8.1 GUIs many Linux developers started trying to implement their own versions, albeit with alterations intended to "fix" the problems with them. But the problem is simply this - all of these giant new ugly interfaces were solutions in search of a problem. The simple fact is that when measuring UI efficiency the good old fashioned cascading menu popularized in Windows XP and 7 simply can't be beat. I can get to every program on my Xubuntu 16.04 or Windows 7 systems in four mouse clicks or less. But with the kindergarten style interfaces GUI efficiency can't even be measured in mouse clicks. It's measured in clicking, scrolling, and even typing text in boxes like good old DOS.

How anyone could ever have thought any of these interfaces were better than what we already had is beyond me. As I said, they were all solutions in search of a problem.

And finally, what newbies did overwhelmingly like was Xubuntu and its Whisker menu. In fact to this day Xubuntu remains the only GUI I was able to permanently convert Windows users with. Every other GUI quickly drove users back to Windows XP or 7. Windows 10 has certainly made my job easier as well, as few people like it. Not only because of the over the top kindergarten GUI, but also because it's stunningly slow, and the loss of privacy. As I tell them, Windows 10 is the first legal botnet, and they use it at their privacy's peril.

[A-Singh]

After changed color Mint took them over at distrowatch

Except distrowatch rankings mean nothing whatsoever.

[jacob]

I sincerely don't wish to offend those who like Unity, but never once in any of my experiences trying to get people to switch to Linux did anyone like it. In fact most people didn't even like the modern Gnome desktop.

Unfortunately it appears that when Microsoft came out with the ungainly Windows 8 and 8.1 GUIs many Linux developers started trying to implement their own versions, albeit with alterations intended to "fix" the problems with them. But the problem is simply this - all of these giant new ugly interfaces were solutions in search of a problem. The simple fact is that when measuring UI efficiency the good old fashioned cascading menu popularized in Windows XP and 7 simply can't be beat. I can get to every program on my Xubuntu 16.04 or Windows 7 systems in four mouse clicks or less. But with the kindergarten style interfaces GUI efficiency can't even be measured in mouse clicks. It's measured in clicking, scrolling, and even typing text in boxes like good old DOS.

How anyone could ever have thought any of these interfaces were better than what we already had is beyond me. As I said, they were all solutions in search of a problem.

And finally, what newbies did overwhelmingly like was Xubuntu and its Whisker menu. In fact to this day Xubuntu remains the only GUI I was able to permanently convert Windows users with. Every other GUI quickly drove users back to Windows XP or 7. Windows 10 has certainly made my job easier as well, as few people like it. Not only because of the over the top kindergarten GUI, but also because it's stunningly slow, and the loss of privacy. As I tell them, Windows 10 is the first legal botnet, and they use it at their privacy's peril.

My experience is the opposite. After the first few iterations, which were objectively terrible, Unity grew to be IMO the best desktop around (that includes Windows and OSX). It is in fact the only reason why I stuck with ubuntu over the past few years despite my increasing frustration with Canonical and the apparent lack of direction. For me Unity 8 was going to be a disaster as it was shaping to be a mobile/tablet UI pretending to be a desktop, and I'm certainly not sorry to see it go. But Unity 7 will be sorely missed.

[muncrief]

My experience is the opposite. After the first few iterations, which were objectively terrible, Unity grew to be IMO the best desktop around (that includes Windows and OSX). It is in fact the only reason why I stuck with ubuntu over the past few years despite my increasing frustration with Canonical and the apparent lack of direction. For me Unity 8 was going to be a disaster as it was shaping to be a mobile/tablet UI pretending to be a desktop, and I'm certainly not sorry to see it go. But Unity 7 will be sorely missed.

Well, I think that's the wonderful thing about Linux. It's not a "one size fits all" system. Instead it can be made to look like just about anything one could imagine while the "engine" that drives it remains common and stable. My argument against Unity has always simply been that I didn't feel it was the optimum default GUI for new users to see and experience. Of course that was based upon my own personal preference, raw GUI efficiency, and anecdotal experiences with users I encountered. But as you stated others like it very much and your experience is different.

I think in the end real scientific polling should be used to determine what's the most appealing to the most users, and that should be the default experience. As for Unity, if it's truly popular enough it will never die. Some group or groups of developers will take the development responsibilities on, and it will be another in the many viable GUIs users can choose from.

In the end my hope is that no matter what GUI is or isn't the most popular, Linux becomes a popular desktop OS. It's so far ahead of Windows in so many ways, and doesn't cost and arm and a leg like Apple, that I still have significant hope that it will one day topple the old behemoths

[dungeon]

Except distrowatch rankings mean nothing whatsoever.

But original Ubuntu included this calendar, so this must have some meaning These were removed later maybe as of Ubuntu 8.04, but it was enough to gain some attention

http://geekfeminism.wikia.com/wiki/Ubuntu_Warty_visual_theme/Image_archive