Shooting for the Perfect 10.10 with Maverick Meerkat

[Robert Avant]

Hi Jono,

There still seems to be a large number of users out there not happy with
the way Ubuntu runs out of the box.  I must admit I am one of them.  The
problem is that while most older hardware has drivers available the
newer stuff does not in all cases.  I have a Medion Laptop Computer with
a Realtek RTL8191SE Wireless LAN 802.11n installed which Ubuntu 10.4
does not recognise.  I guess I will need to use disk wrapper to make it
work.  Also many scanners do not work out of the box even though Linux
drivers are available via the manufactures web site i.e. my Epson
Perfection V100 Photo, only purchased because the HP help-desk said
their kit was NOT Linux compatible and Epson had drivers on their web
site.  Until these standard components are easy to install for first
time users who do not have the first clue as to what to do then Ubuntu
has failed.  

Its no good trying to make it look pretty and perform fast if the these
simple items are not solved with explicit instruction as to what to do
for each device in a newbie friendly way.

Regards

Bob Avant 



On Fri, 2010-04-02 at 18:19 -0700, Jono Bacon wrote: 
> Hi All,
> 
> I just want to re-post Mark announcement of the 10.10 name here so
> everyone is up to speed:
> 
>         It’s time to put our heads together to envision “the perfect
>         10″.
>         
>         This is a time of great innovation and change in the Linux
>         world, with major new initiatives from powerful groups bringing
>         lots of new ideas, new energy and new code. Thanks to the
>         combined efforts of Google, Intel, IBM, Canonical, Red Hat,
>         Oracle, Cisco, ARM, many other companies, Debian and other
>         projects, a hundred startups and tens of thousands of
>         professional and inspired contributors, the open source
>         ecosystem continues to accelerate. We need to bring the best of
>         all of that work into focus and into the archive. For millions
>         of users, Ubuntu represents what Free Software can do out of the
>         box for them. We owe it to everybody who works on Free Software
>         to make that a great experience.
>         
>         At the Ubuntu Developer Summit, in May in Belgium, we’ll have a
>         new design track, and a “cloud and server” track, reflecting
>         some major focal points in 2010. They will complement our
>         ongoing work on community, desktop, kernel, quality assurance,
>         foundations and mobile.
>         
>         Our new theme is “Light”, and the next cycle will embrace that
>         at many levels. We have a continued interest in netbooks, and
>         we’ll revamp the Ubuntu Netbook Edition user interface. As
>         computers become lighter they become more mobile, and we’ll work
>         to keep people connected, all day, everywhere. We’ll embrace the
>         web, aiming for the lightest, fastest web experience on any
>         platform. The fastest boot, the fastest network connect, the
>         fastest browser. Our goal is to ensure that UNE is far and away
>         the best desktop OS for a netbook, both for consumers and power
>         users.
>         
>         On the other end of the spectrum, we’ll be lightening the burden
>         of enterprise deployment with our emphasis on hybrid cloud
>         computing. Ubuntu Server is already very popular on public
>         clouds like EC2 and Rackspace, and now that Dell supports the
>         Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud for private cloud infrastructure, it’s
>         possible to build workloads that run equally well in your data
>         center or on the cloud. We’ll focus on making it even easier to
>         build those workloads and keep them up to date, and managing the
>         configurations of tens, or tens of thousands, of Ubuntu machines
>         running in the cloud.
>         
>         It’s not all about work. We don’t just want to be connected to
>         the internet, we want to be connected to each other. Social from
>         the Start is our initiative to make the desktop a collaborative,
>         social place. For the past five years, we’ve all been shifting
>         more and more data into the web, to a series of accounts and
>         networks elsewhere. Now it’s time to start to bring those social
>         networks back into our everyday computing environment. Our
>         addressbooks and contact lists need to be synchronized and
>         shared, so that we have the latest information everywhere – from
>         mobile phones to web accounts.
>         
>         So there’s a lot to do. I hope you’ll join us in shaping that
>         work.
> 
>         Introducing the Maverick Meerkat
>         
>         Our mascot for 10.10 is the Maverick Meerkat.
>         
>         This is a time of change, and we’re not afraid to surprise
>         people with a bold move if the opportunity for dramatic
>         improvement presents itself. We want to put Ubuntu and free
>         software on every single consumer PC that ships from a major
>         manufacturer, the ultimate maverick move. We will deliver on
>         time, but we have huge scope for innovation in what we deliver
>         this cycle. Once we have released the LTS we have plenty of room
>         to shake things up a little. Let’s hear the best ideas, gather
>         the best talent, and be a little radical in how we approach the
>         next two year major cycle.
>         
>         Meerkats are, of course, light, fast and social – everything we
>         want in a Perfect 10. We’re booting really fast these days, but
>         the final push remains. Changes in the toolchain may make us
>         even faster for every application. We’re Social from the Start,
>         but we could get even more tightly connected, and we could bring
>         social features into even more applications. Meerkats are
>         family-oriented, and we aspire to having Ubuntu being the safe
>         and efficient solution for all the family netbooks. They are
>         also clever – meerkats teach one another new skills. And that’s
>         what makes this such a great community.
> 
>         Here’s looking at the Lynx
>         
>         Lucid is shaping up beautifully, but there’s still a lot to be
>         done to make it the LTS we all want. Thanks to everyone who is
>         bringing their time, energy and expertise to bear on making it
>         outstanding. And I’m looking forward to the release parties, the
>         brainstorming at UDS, and further steps on our mission to bring
>         free software to the world, on free terms.
>         
> Originally posted at http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/336
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> 	Jono
> 
> -- 
> Jono Bacon
> Ubuntu Community Manager
> www.ubuntu.com / www.jonobacon.org
> www.identi.ca/jonobacon www.twitter.com/jonobacon
> 
>