Ubuntu 8.04. Is in destined to be the Vista of the Ubuntu stable?

Question

Only 2 days until RC release, and 9 days until Final. Its still dreadfully unstable if installed from the disc (online upgrade from Gutsy is better) which is weird !

Are the guys at Ubuntu trying too much with Hardy ?

Is Ubuntu going to start becoming bloated ?

I for one sure hope not, as we want quality not quantity !

What are your thoughts ?

Answer 1

Hi, Linux Ubuntu Geek. I don't think its become bloated maybe thats because I install loads of applications on my own. I didn't really get what u meant by bloated though so I can't say anything about that.



I agree with u 100% that its not stable. Only 9 days r left and its even worse than Gutsy was. I installed it on 2 different laptops and it has stopped booting within a week, one of them was working so well and an update broken suspend to ram and disk. Have they fixed your nautilus bug? I still have the bug in which nautilus crashes and the desktop disappears. Only the panels r left then.



On my desktop, I can't even get it to start. It starts with a kernel panic and then restarts and loads into 640x480 resolution mode.



Turns out I checked launch pad and the bugs r all known, but half of them have been just dismissed caused the developers r not getting them. Can u believe it? If u complain on the forums someone just randomly comes and tells u that he doesn't have that problem and case dismissed.



Although I really liked the new open office, its actually very stable. I remember office on ubuntu used to crash once a day for me and in hardy it never crashed at all. Firefox 3 has become really cool as well. Brasero disc burning is a great program and I am glad they finally put that in, I used it on gnome on suse the first time and its great ubuntu has it by default. Another good improvement was the new login screen, it actually looks good and the human theme look nice as well this time. Battery life has become slightly better as well though not as long as Vista gave me on one laptop but still better than Gutsy. The major problem is that the system itself is too unstable.



The main problem with developers this time is that they know that ubuntu is already popular so they r not working as hard anymore. They r also under the impression that since its an LTS release they will have loads of time to fix the bugs later on, and they r not willing to delay the final release.



Anyway I just tried out SUSE developer version and package management has become really FAST. As fast as Debian and the developers r promising that it will get even faster and they will use the same update manager that fedora and ubuntu use now cause package management has sped up that much.



I still don't get how u managed to make ubuntu more stable by upgrading. Did u check of it does something differently cause may be I could do that on a fresh install.



Take care!

Answer 2

Actually, since it is a LTS release, it is supposed to be more stable. Have you tried it on other machines? I haven't personally tried it so I can not speak for either party. As with LTS as well, they are not trying to implement very many new features but their focus is on stability. Indeed, with most of the Ubuntu releases, much of the change is contributed by the people of GNOME. If you compare their release notes, you will notice how much overlap there actually is.



Anyways, like with all products, even after an official release you should never jump the gun and get it. I will be waiting 1-2 months before upgrading to 8.04 so that there are plenty of patches and such to fix anything that they missed in the Betas and RC releases.



You must define bloat, really. With Windows, much of the bloat comes from backwards compatibility. If it were up to me, I would start all over with a fresh kernel and NO backwards compatibility. They may take a financial hit at first but they are Microsoft, leaders of vendor lock-in. They will find a way.

In Ubuntu, I can not imagine what bloat must be. With a modular kernel, the 'bloat' is not really loaded anyways until you need it. And with Hard Drives as large as they are today, I do not think space is an issue. Ubuntu is a modern distribution with modernish requirements. If you need something lighter, then you should get a lighter distribution.



Edit:

Of course. We will just have to wait and see. If you are happy with an OS, then there really is no need to upgrade. 7.10 is not outdated and will still be supported for another year. By then we will have 2 more Ubuntu releases to play with. I'm sure they do not want to lose a user base and I am also certain that 8.04 will be stable soon. If 8.04 is not stable, then they may be forced to extend 6.06's lifespan. I am sure those developers do not want to do that. Any major problems we have with 8.04 will probably be worked out quickly. Smaller quirks will have fixes detailed in the forums.

Answer 3

I have to say i agree...My test system i use had been running gutsy for some time and i did a complete fresh install of hardy and frankly i have hardware compatibility issues that never existed in the gutsy install...i mean seriously question when we go backwards in native hardware support...I have faith they will get it worked out in the first few patches...i'm assuming at this point they won't by the final release date...In the mean time i will be waiting for a little more stability before migrating it onto my everyday system...but it's LTS release so their definately going to get it worked out...i hope

Answer 4

I will stick to Gusty for at least 6 months and perhaps install Hardy in windows. Not tried it yet so can't say much.

Answer 5

Haven't even looked to see what's yet. Gutsy is doing fine for me so I might just stick for a while. Its not as if you don't get package updates anyway.

Answer 6

Last time i tried it it was still very very bloated. I am going to try again tonight on a virtual machine and will get back to ya.