LUCID LYNX - UBUNTU COMES OUT OF THE CLOSET

Ubuntu 10.4 LTS, Lucid Lynx, builds on the major improvements introduced in last year's breakthrough 9.10 Karmic Koala release (improved boot time, optimized kernel for better desktop performance, Grub2 bootloader and ext4 filesystem). New features therefore center mainly on two areas - a long overdue facelift and an assortment of new cloud-facing applications and features.

INSTALLATION AND BOOT

The major innovation here is K[ernel] M[ode] S[etting], which simply means that screen resolution and depth are set from the kernel at boot time to enable smooth graphics during the boot process. However, with some graphics cards, this can cause the installer, or even the installed system, to hang or crash on boot. Fortunately there is a fairly simple and well documented fix (see column right) which involves disabling KMS. This blorts the beautiful new boot splash, but boot time is slashed anyway - down from 50s on 9.10 to under 30s on this LG P1 Express Dual laptop.

HARDWARE

Once the KMS bug is sorted, the bundled Radeon driver provides direct rendering and is capable enough to power a slick desktop running Compiz, full-screen video and screencasting apps. The ATI Radeon Mobility X1400, however, is not currently supported by the proprietary fglrx driver for kernels above 2.6.30, so Nexuiz will have to wait.
Sound plays out of the box with good quality and at full volume on the internal (Intel HDA) card. For recording, I use an M-AUDIO external USB card, a job which is made easier by the Sound Preferences Applet. Wireless networking works flawlessly out of the box and setting up bluetooth to connect to a mobile phone is a cinch. Setting up printing and scanning (HP PSC1510) is a matter of one or two clicks.
There is still the odd glitch with external storage devices. The notorious USB copy bug where copying speeds for large files drop off to about 2MB/s is still present, meaning that it takes 5-6 mins to copy a CD-sized file. I also had problems with a Kingston SD card, which is only detected if inserted on boot and once unmounted, fails to remount, although other cards work as expected. Hibernation works but suspend is hit and miss - it may work or just hang on a black screen, requiring a hard reboot.

APPLICATIONS AND CODECS

One welcome novelty is the addition of Simple Scan, a graphical frontend for sane. It exemplifies what Ubuntu has done well over the years by lending already existing applications that needed veneer of usability and desktop integration, (and please, don't mention OCR).
In the same vein of preferring simplicity over functionality, Lucid Lynx includes Pitivi, a simple cut-and-splice video editor, and drops Gimp in favour of F-Spot. This is presumably also the reason the plain, off-the-shelf Transmission Bittorrent client is preferred over the more powerful Deluge.


Codecs for proprietary formats like flash and mp3 can be set up easily with
sudo apt-get install ubuntu-restricted-extras
The Rhythmbox music player has become steadily less responsive and more capricious over the last few releases, and the integration of the Ubuntu One Store (another iKnock-off) has done nothing to remedy this. The impression is of a hastily done and somewhat botched job - the Ubuntu One icon looks literally like someone shit all over it and a stalled progress bar has been left hanging at the foot of the window.


Quibbles over mono aside, Banshee is just as pretty and more responsive, and rips CDs into the bargain. Other cloud-facing applications (read Gwibber) give some insight into the new demographic targeted by Lucid Lynx, the teenage / young twenty-something user who doesn't really care what software his / her computer is running as long as it enables him / her to shoot from the hip on Feckr or Slapper. Old school Linux non-conformists will be reaching for their ISOs.

BRANDING & APPEARANCE

The new branding and logo are visible chiefly on the boot splash screen and are tastefully done, and the ubiquitous mauve, particularly in the terminal, is definitely sensual and immersive. The new themes merge the window title bar with the menu bar by giving both the same charcoal colouring, which, together with the (slightly fudged) rounded corners, gives the window a sort of gambrel roof look. On my box, this causes tearing when the window is dragged and, in any case, leaves a thick charcoal strip under the title bar if you use an alternative window decorator such as Emerald. Window buttons are rounded and repositioned on the right, OSX-style, and rounded sliders and progress bars move comfortably in rounded grooves.


In general, with cosmetic issues, if you don't like it, you can always change it. All the same, this time round, things are not quite as straightforward as you might expect. It is difficult to avoid the sensation that choices are being deliberately limited because, among other things, the design team have been careful to remove the default human theme. You can get it back from the repos with
sudo apt-get install human-theme
Then do
sudo apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager compiz-fusion-plugins-extra emerald
In the CompizConfig Settings Manager, change the Window Decorator command to
/usr/bin/emerald
Restart Compiz, and Emerald will place the window buttons in their default position on the right.

THE VERDICT

The cumulative impression, that the development team secretly think OSX is superior to Linux is difficult to avoid. According to one Ubuntu community leader, quoted at jordanopensource.org, many of the artists that created this new design were using Apple Macs and proprietary software as their developing platform. It would be surprising to see a team which is unwilling to eat its own dogfood trying to sell Linux on its merits.
Be that as it may, Ubuntu continues to rest on the very solid foundations provided by Debian, using best-of-breed software like the apt package manager and the Gnome desktop and packing an array of powerful tools like sshfs under its shiny hood.
On the whole, this iteration presents a few glitches but no major regressions over its predecessor. It represents an incremental advance, inspired by Apple envy and the desire to ride (and eventually monetise) current and foreseeable trends in networking and cloud computing. New users, or users of versions prior to 9.10, would do well to install this release, although anyone who has Karmic Koala installed has already got all the system he needs.

The 'nomodeset' fix.
The solution is to hit the spacebar once you see the keyboard and stick figure, choose Try ubuntu without installing and hit F6 to edit the boot command. Add the arguments
i915.modeset=0 xforcevesa
and continue installation from the desktop icon.
Once the system is installed, press and hold down shift on boot if necessary to get to a boot menu, then press e to edit and replace 'quiet splash' with 'nomodeset'.
To make this setting permanent, I created a file /etc/modprobe.d/radeon-kms.conf and added the line
options radeon modeset = 0
Other options are explained in the Release Notes.

nice

Posted by busyman