Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala – Review

I am writing this blog post in the aptly named “Post Blog Entry” program I installed into the latest Ubuntu release. I installed this several nights ago, and think I finally have a decent grip to be able to give an honest review of the latest.

Let me be first to say that if you thought Windows 7 and Snow Leopard weren’t full releases, you’ll feel the same way here. It’s a little polish here, a little update there. That being said, there are a few things I really like.

Package Management has Grown Up

The Ubuntu Software Center has taken finding free software, and made it mature and usable. No more trying to figure out what works with what you have, which version of the window manager you are using, etc. It seems to do a great job identifying software you can run with solid descriptions and one-click installing. That’s hard to complain about and if you are fine with the quality of open source software, you should be very happy with how easy it is to install.

Cleaning House

Ubuntu seems to have gotten the point. Nobody needs the massive amount of software that used to come pre-installed. Now you get some system tools, a couple games, a couple graphics apps, a collection of communication tools, office suite and a couple of audio applications.

Keeping Up

The top right corner of the screen seems to have taken a leap in usefulness. I get network connectivity, audio control, Instant Messaging and Email, Date and Time and User Account control. That’s all useful, not too much, not too little. Very subtle, but very nice.

The Bad

Now with that, there are still some things about Ubuntu I really don’t get. Why is Ubuntu so obsessed with brown. Now they seem to have transitioned a bit to orange, but the OS is still very brownish. It has a very unpolished looking user interface. KDE and Gnome are both capable of fantastic graphic things, they just don’t put it in the box.

Sometimes I think that the hoards of geeks working on Linux distributions don’t pay attention to real users at all. As much as it seems like no big deal, people care about flash. People care about style and people care about looks. Ubuntu has made the least of it’s strides in the last half dozen releases in this department.

The brutal reality is that sitting beside a Windows or Mac computer, Ubuntu looks dated, amateur and cheap. Now before the Linux community lights their torches and starts burning my site down, this is not a slam, it’s some honest feedback. If I didn’t care, I wouldn’t continue to install the latest versions of Fedora and Ubuntu to keep up with the changes. It’s not something I do because I want to find the bad, I am honestly curious.

Linux is usable. But it’s usable in the same way that a folding chair compares to a Lazy-Boy recliner. I can sit in that chair, but I wouldn’t want to sit there long.

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