Most definitely... I liked how FreeBSD came packed with all of my development tools, but really, Synaptic and apt-get rock pretty hard, so it's been really easy getting everything set up the way I want it. I actually think they made some pretty good decisions in choosing what to include and what not to include once you realize how easy it is to get it personalized.

I did hear one idea that Ubuntu should let you choose on installation your software (KDE vs Gnome, what development software, etc.) but compared to FreeBSD I very much prefer to get everything up and running before making those decisions. To understand why Ubuntu is how it is, I just took a step back and took a look from an overview of what Ubuntu brings to the table versus other distros.

i like the bare essentials ubuntu gives the newbies. just enough with a few extra to give confidence on a successful install. now we have a chance to adjust and learn what we really do and don't need then we can learn and build ourselves. in other words, "getting our feet wet one toe at a time". ubuntu is great and i'm proud of my decision to dump windows for this special distro.

@rob

More or less my shock at many of them items I guess, is that they weren't default install items. So really for me as a slackware user, using ubuntu, I was like,...hmmmm where's my headers? where's my portmap I need to talk to other pc's and there's nothing here. I need to roll a new kernel, this default install runs like poo.

Really the shock, was just as far as being a slack user trying out ubuntu is all. Those items are default in a lot of distro's suse, fedora, slackware, so me even being new to linux, it was just a curveball is all.

The printer icon, well I'm running kde on ubuntu, i dont really like the gnome gui all too much, so the printer setup is totally missing..no big deal I did the text files anyway or i could have opened up a browser and gone to localhost:631 etc etc But in the kde yeah there's no printer admin setup.

Firewall, well I think that they should down the road just make a readme note on default users desktop advising prebuilt options that can come in. I state this as a recommendation for down the pike is all.

I've made about 30 debs so far so yea I needed them build essetials, again they downloaded and went in in seconds so that was fine....I just had to spend 10 minutes to find out how to use apt lol, and see what I had and didnt have, remember former slacker here.

I guess you could say, those items I mention are what a slacker would need to know before putting ubuntu on a friends pc is all.

All in all I really think this distro has some awesome potential. I've tried suse, but it just breaks itself IMO mileage may vary. Fedora was ok...but it had real issues with nfs at the time, an unknown bug at the time, now fixed i hear. Mepis has always been good to me if I didnt need 3d rendering w/ATI cards, and if the pc was 800mhz or more.

I think they really hit many of their major goals so far.

The only thing right now, as I'm very new to ubuntu is figuring out this lvm evm stuff and where it works etc. It's a nice feature from what I read that's not on slackware.

I look forward to edgy coming out...the boot time in ubuntu is really slow and it's akward, I have no info on screen when I say shutdown or reboot...just the monitor powers off, and it goes thru shutdown sequence. Maybe an ATI bug, not sure, or something with my KDM...gotta research that more.

Will I use ubuntu as my primary desktop...schools still out on that. My older pc's well, they have to stay slackware, there really is nothing out there like it for under 500 mhz machines. For my fast pc, it's a tuff race to me between ubuntu and slackware. The slackware is just, I dont know how to put it...so clean, never ever a hickup even on pc133 running KDE! And since it's one owner/maintainer really, Pat V. it's easy to find out what's going on, and he is so quick w/updates, patches and they always work. But the wealth of software that's open to me becuase it has gnome as well as KDE on ubuntu is a big plus, whereas it's really click and run...no making packages like slackware. I don't know this is a doozy

Hi everyone,
For few years now I've been thinking of trying Linux but never had the courage to try any of it.. always been told it's complicated and could mess up the computer if you did't know what you're doing.. for 6 months now I've been buyin magz with Linux Distros and after my WindowsXP Pro refused to work last night (even after reformatting the drive and reinstalled), I decided to give Ubuntu a try (what the heck I thought.. what else could happen).. to my amazement and sheer delight everything worked just beautifully.. and everything already included.. office stuff.. internet browsers as well as messenger programs.. can't wait to learn more about this excellent OS.. I'm almost converted already.

@x_Jaz_x: be sure to check into qemu or vmware server

That makes sense. Suse 10.1 didn't install gcc by default either. That was only slightly annoying but no big deal.

Thanks for the background info, Fogie.

Hi x_Jaz_x, welcome to LinuxQuestions and Ubuntu. Fogie's mocking you, and is suggesting you to install Windows again in a virtual machine (within Linux), at least. - You might enjoy reading this article (Linux is not Windows)...

And keep on enjoying Ubuntu, even if almost any further step (from the initial desktop) might require Google'ing, asking or reading Howtos (most of the latter work flawlessly, and Ubuntu should be one of the best-documented Linux distributions at all).

Here's the Ubuntu Guide, and here's basic information on about everything, to get started.

No no I wasn't mocking. I just meant that if he should so desire, the vmware and qemu work so well, that he can try different distro's put in windows in case he's missing some much needed app's etc.

I think it's one of the neatest things to ever happen.

Now I personally have no need to use windows in it, as I have two pc's at the desk. But for running other distro's as trial, or a router/firewall etc

It's a really neat toy if nothing else.

I think there should be a newcomer alert on every linux distro about this virtualization stuff.

Personally, I never could get wine to run on any distro but I was really new so I gave up and put another pc at the desk, problem solved.

As for VMWare, finally, EasyVMX.com is online again!

It enables users to easily create empty virtual machines (not only VMWare's predefined ones) for the gratis version of the VMWare Player. Simply attach a (Windows) install CD in the shape of an .ISO file, boot from it, and there you go!

Yep...I'm running the edgy live cd nearly every day and might replace my Kubuntu partition with it when it's released...

You're running the Edgy Live CD instead of running Dapper from the harddisk (which is, of course, much faster)?
Why?

Maybe the feeling of using bleeding edge software!?

Actually, that's not an answer.

For fun, I'm sure. I ran it in VMware. Really cool, boots in a few seconds. But at the moment, not all that different from dapper, except the apps are the latest version, whereas in dapper we don't even have the latest firefox.

The way I have my system setup is:
hda1 = Latest stable Kubuntu (Dapper)
hda2 = SWAP
hda3 = Latest development version of Kubuntu (Currently Edgy)

So I can test out the latest version as a running system and still have a fall-back if I mess things up too much. I was actually running the Dapper version on hda3 when Breezy was the stable version.

There are some major changes in Edgy too, the new upstart (the event-based init replacement), the 2.6.17-8 kernel (much faster, and I mean much) to name just two.

If you are running a server or firewall/router then it's not a good idea to run the development version, unless you do it in VMware, as it's still a work in progress. But I have to say, I haven't had many problems with Edgy, less than I did with Dapper development version. The development release knot-3 was released a not long ago if you want to check it out. Both LiveCD and Alternate CD ISOs are available.