ive been using Ubuntu 7.10 for about 3 weeks now and i love it more than any other linux operating system. ive been watching the countdown to the upgrade of ubuntu 8.04. has any one tried out the 8.04 beta at all. if so, did u think it is worth upgrading my box to 8.04 or should i keep it at 7.10? also, is it possible to upgrade ur box without deleting ur data or should i just copy everything to an external hard drive and create a text file showing the packages i have downloaded and installed on my box now?
Previous upgrades have been very smooth; once 8.04 is official, your Update Manager will notify you and offer to upgrade. It's not all that different from the regular security updates, just a lot more packages. However, they still have some wrinkles in that, so I would recommend that you try the Live CD on your hardware before you take the plunge. A lot of packages and dependencies change between major releases, and sometimes, it turns out that an older version still works better.
Personally, I actually keep two boot partitions, and all my own stuff on a separate partition, so I can have two releases installed in parallel and dual-boot between them. It was useful when 6.10 worked with my scanner but 7.04 didn't. (No problem with 7.10 there, so I have been running that exclusively since it came out.)
Having said that, there are also still some things which work better from a reinstall; migrating from an older version to a newer one will not give you exactly the same result e.g. when it comes to Gnome settings in your home directory, Firefox plug-ins, etc etc. Usually the differences are harmless but it might still be something to watch out for down the road.
I've been running the beta for a week or two on my computer at work (sic, my production system) and would say that the upgrade to Firefox 3.0 alone makes it worth upgrading, but YMMV.
I definitely recommend trying the persistent USB stick; saves you from burning a CD you only use half a dozen times, and real handy to keep in your pocket just in case. It's not entirely trivial to set up but the instructions on the wiki are pretty decent. LiveUsbPendrivePersistent - Ubuntu Wiki
thanks
do you know of any good sites to show how to dual boot ubuntu 7.10 and 8.04 (basicly just two versions of it). a site with site (easier for me to understand) ive tried a couple of sites but none of them have worked. i couldnt get it to boot rite
and i had to redo my hard drive the last time i tried
thanks
TexasOne
another thing would be if i wanted to try out kubuntu. would dual boot screw anything up with having a gnome and kde desktop dual boot. also, any views on the kde enviroment verses gnome enviroment would be greatly appreciated.
You just need to have enough partitions, one for each install (plus, as mentioned above, probably a good idea to have your data outside of those, so you can access it from either installation). At install time, leave one partition empty and then let the other installer install to that. They should be perfectly able to coexist peacefully, in my experience.
Can't say much about KDE, I've been using Gnome and never saw any reason to try K. I basically just use the GUI to launch my music player and browser anyway, and everything else happens in Emacs or the terminal.
They seem to have a wider spectrum of software written specifically for KDE but most of it will run in Gnome just fine as well. From a programmer's point of view I understand Qt (the KDE toolkit) is pretty much best in class, but I haven't done any GUI programming myself, so can't really comment on that. My prejudist opinion is that KDE seems more oriented towards eye candy, but my KDE friend says Gnome is impossible to use without a mouse, whereas he routinely uses KDE from the keyboard only. Anyway, both of them have a fair share of programs which quite horrible usability -- I guess a lot of developers assume it will Just Work as long as they have an all-dancing, all-singing animated color-flashing GUI. (Ahem. Gets off soapbox. Pardon me.)
This is like a blog type post.
as im typing, Ubuntu Hardy Heron is setting up installation on my pc. the live session im on now almost made me cry of joy.
Thank you Gawds of Linux for this. ive got about 4 days left of vacation to use it. i dont htink im going to sleep much. im almost wondering if i should keep windows on my main computer.(i will cause wine cant handle all windows apps and programs)
ok, i just installed it and im looking through the changes. on the application menu, im missing some things like system tools, etc. i tried to add them thru the menu editor, but when ever i check the box next to the system tools or anyother menu, it reverts it and unchecks it automatically. how do i stop that
Is this after a dist-upgrade or on a newly installed system? Does the System Tools thing still exist in Hardy? (What's it for?) Can you find the menu file for it and see if it still contains valid information? (Just a vague hunch, for a system upgraded for a previous version.)
yea, scratch that last statement. I'm still adjusting to linux. I made the biggiest windows user type error ever. in the main menu setup, i was checking options like system tools without haveing any options within the menu checked which is why it wouldn't show up. now i feel like an idiot.
i just updated my laptop from gusty to hardy since i use hardy on my desktop, and I hate it on my laptop. it literally took about five minutes to close all the crash windows and i lost all customizations. i have horrible hardware on the laptop so... if i stay with gusty on the laptop, can I just upgrade the things like GNOME, file manager, and other things updated in hardy or would i have to install hardy and uninstall the programs that crash and install the older version, like firefox??
i am running hardy on a dell d600 w/1gb ram, pentium 1.6 m. i backed up my stuff and did a fresh install. after the install, it has been running clean..... the install came w/firefox 3.0... which i my humble opinion is Great!
its a IBM T40. and the Radeon Mobility m7 7500 just crashed all. i no that i can unblacklist it (and ill try that once Im dont writing this), but things like firefox 3.0 made me made because all addons and plugins arent compatable. so i lose my OSX costomizations. oh well. I want more expirience. I might dual boot and try it. but any word on this as in Lenny vs Hardy would be nice.