Ubuntu circus set to start again

By Sam Varghese
Friday, 17 April 2009 07:06

Technology

Six days from today, the Ubuntu circus will start all over again. The release of version 9.04 is scheduled for April 23 and lots of bandwidth will be consumed that day as people upgrade or else download the distribution for the first time.
Once the release is publicised on the American technology news accumulation site Slashdot (one of the few times when Slashdot links to something as soon as it happens; most of its borrowed, US-centric, insular "news" is generally anything from two to 10 days old and an insult to any genuine nerd) the lemmings who frequent the site will grab onto one of the many teats that provide a download of 9.04 and start sucking.

What's new in Ubuntu 9.04? There is a new point version of GNOME - 2.26 comes with Brasero as the default application for burning discs and improved handling of multiple monitors.

Exactly what kind of crowd is waiting for these features and unable to go to sleep without them?

There is a new point version of X.org, Wacom tablet hot-plugging is available, there is a new style of notifications, a new point version of the kernel, and support for the ext4 filesystem.

The ext4 filesystem, from all reports, is not yet usable by the average user. To make it available to new users as a feature is, in my book at least, somewhat irresponsible. These are the kind of features that, when bedded down, will add to the strengths of Linux. When used by newbies before they are properly vetted, they tend to result in outpourings that give Linux a bad name.

The Ubuntu server being released next week has a technology preview version of Eucalyptus that can be used "to deploy, experiment and test your own private cloud that matches the Amazon EC2 API." And dovecot-postfix is available, "an easy-to-deploy mail server stack, with support for SMTP, POP3, and IMAP with TLS and SASL."

CONTINUED