Ubuntu a crazy distro or just plain stupid?
 

So Canonical (Ubuntu) just announced they are moving away from Xorg, and Wayland all together and they will develop their own display server/protocol called mir for future releases.
What do you guys think about this move, is going to bite them back or it will make Ubuntu the ground breaking distro?

Just few month ago we all considered Ubuntu a distro for newbies and users who didn't like tinkering too much with their OS. Personally I think of Ubuntu as the distro that has converted lot of people over to Linux and it has introduced new things like Steam and Netflix. I am actually excited about their release for Phone and tablet too.

When I was introduced to the Open Source family of OSs Ubuntu was the OS it was given to me by an online friend. Then was the 8.04 and many releases later I still have it installed in my desktop 12.04 now. For sure I have thought many times in replace it with something else I keep it there because that is the family computer and everybody knows where to find their personal files and stuff.

I don't really know what to think about this change that they are doing are you guys excited about it?

As soon as an OS starts thinking for me I dont like it and thats what I take away from here. There are going to be reasons that people can provide as to why they are getting rid of the support but at the end of the day I should have the choice of using whatever display I want and not be limited by the operating system itself.

At what point does a distro that runs on the Linux kernel become segregated from the rest of the Linux distros out there and become essentially its own operating system? Well this move is a step in that direction for Ubuntu in my opinion.

Similar thread already on this topic, although in the Slackware forum:

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...ir-4175452724/

For Newbie users I usually recommend Linux Mint over Ubuntu

I, Myself, have switched to Fuduntu for my Desktop/Laptop needs...

--C

Ubuntu is definitely proactive. Too proactive in my opinion where I might be using Free BSD someday. All I think Linux really needs is a documentation standard. They realize it's a hostel world and don't sit around waiting to fall behind. :twocents:

Yeah I should mention, I kind of understand that they are trying to integrate their mobil OS with the Desktop OS and therefore they need a different display server to works with both. However I also have noticed when they guys at Canonical introduced Unity everyone hated it and now its been ported to other distros like Arch and it was and effort to get in for OpenSuse.

Perhaps nowadays LinuxMint is the distro for newbies but four years ago Ubuntu was the distro for newbies, now I dont know what kind of users Ubuntu is for.

So instead of focusing their effort on fixing the NUMEROUS bugs with their current OS, they're going to completely change things with a brand new display server and introduce even more, fantastic.

Is it just me, or are the early adoption distros like Fedora and Ubuntu just accelerating faster and faster toward a completely unstable and unusable OS? I mean seriously, the farther Ubuntu gets from it's base (Debian), the less and less stable it gets. Around version 8, when Ubuntu was still pretty similar to Debian, things were great, 10 was still pretty good, 11 starting to get worse, 12 is pretty bad. I tried installing 12 on my system and almost nothing worked. Wifi was constantly dropping out, the display didn't work well, sound didn't work. And now they want to introduce a new display server, because their previous efforts to distinguish themselves from the rest of Linux have worked out so well?

Oh well. I didn't use Ubuntu before the switch, and I certainly won't be using them after. Just more incentive for me to not recommend that distro to newcomers.

I never liked ubuntu even in it's early hay days :/ it just never clicked with me

I came in the Linux world with Ubuntu and I am still an Ubuntu user. Though but now I try a different
workaround for Unity by installing Cinnamon desktop.

I think Ubuntu is becoming more like Android. Linux but not Linux. They will keep changing everything that
will change the experience of Linux. But I think this will reduce the user base of Ubuntu and the users will
keep on migrating to other +buntus or other distros.
I would always want Ubuntu to care of their large community and keep everything Linux-like. That will help.

Regards.

When you look at Mark Shuttleworth's blog it becomes pretty clear that the move to the Mir display server solely is based on political motivation.
While Ubuntu started as community distribution with the motto "Linux for human beings" it is now switching over to being a company driven distribution, where nothing but marketshare counts. Shuttleworth, besides mostly basing his distribution on community effort and not contributing much back, wants to be the leader of the Linux ecosystem.
http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/1228
To achieve this goal Canonical wants to have total control over system critical parts. They have already their own init system and their own DE. They could use Wayland as display server, but they have no control over their direction, so they rather dismiss the effort of planning and implementing a sane design for a display server, done in the last five years by the Wayland team (which consistd mostly of experienced Xorg developers) and think they can come up with their own display server in much less time with a team that is inexperienced with writing display servers and didn't even had a look at Wayland is doing.
IMHO, Mir is an already doomed project, most non-Ubuntu devlopers don't see a need for it (anything you can do with Mir can also be achieved with Wayland) and won't support it, unless it will have serious number of distributions that use it.

In short, my opinion about this: Canonical switched Ubuntu from being community driven to being company driven, as a user or community based developer you don't count much for them, besides that it would be nice if you sign the CLA, so that your code can easily be relicensed by Canonical if they wish so. It is solely: We will be the leaders, follow us, give us your code, but don't expect to be part of us or that you will get something back.

Basically, with these moves Canonical/Shuttleworth is backstabbing Ubuntu without noticing it.

As far as I can tell, nobody has ever been forced to use Ubuntu, but Canonical and Shuttleworth do a brilliant job of making sure that tons of people continue to discuss it. Endlessly. Seems like a lot of people who don't even use Ubuntu spend a great deal of time talking about it. I suspect that Canonical and Shuttleworth make a conscious effort to "keep it in the news."

Keeping Canonical/Ubuntu in the news is the one thing that they can really do good. However, sometimes, like in this case, they do a bad job with the topic they are in the news about. If Canonical came up with a straightforward "We create a new display server because we want to have control over the source." there wouldn't be such a fuss about the whole thing. instead they chose to make up some FUD and damage Waylands image with it.

And exactly that is the reason why this happens: What Canonical has done here does not only has impact on Ubuntu, it influences the whole Linux ecosystem.

I might have been ok with their decision if they hadn't badmouthed Wayland at the same time they announced Mir. I think Shuttleworth has pretty much given the Linux community the middle finger. Which is a shame because political infighting and fragmentation will only weaken Linux as a whole.

Initiatives like Mir typical benefit the larger community, as their innovations propagate into or get forked into other projects.

That said, Ubuntu's "one UI for tablets, phones and PCs" direction sounds like they're trying to build another Windows 8.

They will move from Xorg and develop their own display server? Wow, they can't handle ready-to-use debian packages. What a server they talking about?

Crazy or stupid?
Create a system to compete with Microsoft by starting with a stable Linux system, removing the names Linux and GNU from everything, add bug-riddled software and promote the result as a great system.
Crazy or stupid? I know which I vote for.

Shuttleworth chose the wrong path to pursue his dream. The way to go about such an endeavour is to take the time to put together a stable, or relatively stable, system, then promote it. His approach of constantly making changes and introducing them before they are ready is a stupid business model. But the six month release must be met! (How many of Canonical's would be competitors release a new version every half year?) He could even have followed Red Hat's model. A stable retail version and a free testing version. He seems to believe that a pretty interface is all that is needed to attract and keep users. People do not mind bugs and breakage, as long as the screen looks pretty and they get "trophies" for using the system.

Creating their own utilities, such as GUI and an Xorg replacement fit well with the vision of a locked-down OS competing with the big fish, but requires planning and careful implementation. If they succeed in creating this Mir thingie, it will be the same as Unity. Introduced too early in the desire to meet the arbitrary release cycle, make the system even slower and more bug-riddled, and result in even more people abandoning the system. In the end, Shuttleworth's strategy is self-destructive.

It will probably benefit the larger community to the same degree as Unity. (Nothing)

For years, it seems like we've been seeing the same pattern. Every few months, there's something "controversial" coming from Canonical, followed by hand-wringing and criticism from members of the Linux community. It's like clockwork. I wonder what Linux would be like without Canonical stirring things up every now and then. No more entertaining forum threads like this one...