I'm sure lots of people have lots of thoughts on them, but personally I'd like to give a shout out to Canonical. At least from my perspective in the early days of DigitalOcean the few interactions I did have with them were super positive, they seemed to really want us to win. I'll always have a soft spot Ubuntu and as far as community stewards go, on average Mark Shuttleworth has been good. Thanks Ubuntu Community! Thanks Mark! Thanks Canonical!
Ubuntu was leaps ahead of Mandrake at least in installation friendliness, which, let's face it - is often the biggest hurdle getting people interested. The installer wasn't bad, but kinda threw you to the wolves wrt partitioning and such. As a novice, I had no idea what this meant.
Ubuntu came along and made it easy. A live bootable image to play with and see work, and an installer that just let you click through and let it do the dirty work without me having to know what I was doing. That went a long way, and IIRC was the first of its kind to take this approach.
I'd honestly still be using it today if not for snaps. I generally don't like tinkering and optimizing, much preferring to just get something working quickly and out of my way.
I don't recall Mandrake being particularly difficult, although it's been a long time and I don't remember much details, but it was my first Linux distro back in the day. From what I recall, the installation was very similar to Ubuntu(?) I guess my memory of things must be wrong.
Might be interesting to get a hold of an old Mandrake install CD and try in QEMU.
I do remember I had some problems upgrading Mandrake: after the upgrade I just got gibberish on the screen – some X problems I guess, but I didn't have the skill to debug it at the time. I just reinstalled with FreeBSD (which I had tried before Mandrake, but I couldn't get "xfree86 -configure" to work – the second time I had learned enough from Mandrake to make that work) and didn't look much at Linux for a long time after that.
Looking at release dates for Mandrake, FreeBSD, and Ubuntu, I think I must have used Mandrake 9.x, or maybe 8.x. I found a video of that: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBpRuXjHTw8 – in a quick watch-though, it seems roughly similar to what I remember of early Ubuntu (actually, in a quick check it seems that very early Ubuntu only had a text installer?)
I think Linux is inherently a bit tricky/hard for a newbie, because unlike Windows or macOS it can't just assume it's going to be the only OS. Installing e.g. Windows isn't necessarily newbie-friendly either – it's just that most people never have to do that.
You also need to add PPAs to get the non-snap versions of certain applications, like Firefox, since Ubuntu's deb package for it just installs the snap.
This wasn't true the last time I messed with it. I used synaptic to install packages, and many would just install the snap version anyways. Has that changed?
I learned linux proper because I ordered a mandrake CD in the mail. I saw a friends Slackware and I presumed it was just a "cooler windows" or something, so I ordered Mandrake, installed it, was like uh oh..oooh shit... this isn't windows at all...!!! But I couldn't figure out how to go back to NTFS so I just learned linux instead ha. Doubt I'd be here today if it was not for Mandrake (and basically hand rolling a modem driver).
I believe Ubuntu has been a positive for the Linux community. While there definitely were distributions before Ubuntu that focused on the user experience (Mandrake Linux and Lindows/Linspire come to mind), there are many people whose first experience with desktop Linux was through Ubuntu. Although I personally prefer FreeBSD for my Unix needs and Debian if I need actual Linux, Ubuntu is the distribution I recommend to those who are coming from Windows or macOS who want to try out desktop Linux. The last few times I used Ubuntu, whether it's on actual hardware or inside a VM, it seems to be reasonably simple to install, has sensible defaults, and supports a wide range of hardware.
Agreed - Ubuntu is the path of least resistance for installing Linux on your laptop or desktop.
But I still appreciate KDE-based Linux environments for their more straightforward, consistent, no-nonsense GUI, which seems to be derived from classic (pre Windows 8) Windows. Another thing that KDE seems to have gotten right is realizing that what makes macOS and Windows useful isn't just the GUI itself but the set of apps that use it and interoperate seamlessly with each other.
Ubuntu seems to have more UI churn than I'd like (even though I prefer Mac-style menu bars, etc.) And Wayland (which KDE has also moved to for better or for worse) has never brought me happiness.
I understand the motivation for Snaps, but I only want them for app store type apps, not for everything.
> But I still appreciate KDE-based Linux environments for their more straightforward, consistent, no-nonsense GUI, which seems to be derived from classic (pre Windows 8) Windows. Another thing that KDE seems to have gotten right is realizing that what makes macOS and Windows useful isn't just the GUI itself but the set of apps that use it and interoperate seamlessly with each other.
I am deeply confused by this passage. KDE takes a much less staunch top-down development approach than Gnome, which means that every KDE application, and sometimes even with the KDE GUI, things are done their own way. It makes for a very disjointed experience when UI/UX patterns don't transfer between applications.
Its why I always end up switching back to Gnome, despite deeply disliking the flipside of the Gnome team's attitude. For example, it is beyond me why they haven't integrated Dock-to-Dash, Tiling Assistant and Night Theme Switcher. Especially Dash-to-Dock is so vastly popular that I reckon there's more people running Gnome with rather than without.
When was the last time you used KDE? Cause this time around that hasn't been my experience at all, it's gnome that's currently really disjointed with random hamburger menus and whitespace everywhere.
Current KDE feels like the most well put together DE I've ever used, and its really efficient once I get my custom keybinds in there.
And no, Gnome is not inconsistent. I just opened a bunch of applications, and they either have a hamburger menu on the top left or top right, mostly with the same options list and "About" at the bottom of the list. There is some slight visual difference between GTK4 applications and GTK3 applications that are yet to have a rewrite, but it is very consistent. Which does comes with the aforementioned problem of the Gnome devs being very "my way or the highway".
In a strange way KDE reminds me of Windows, where the application devs always seem to be using 3-4 different frameworks, 3-4 different installers, and none of them try to get more than broad consistency between eachother.
I did say in my experience, whereas you seem to be speaking in absolutes.
Either way I disagree with you. I think we have differing opinions of what good actually is, and gnome just isn't good anymore to me. Best of luck to you though.
I personally started with Mint and that's what I would recommend. It's "straightforward, consistent, no-nonsense" and works out of the box. Cinnamon is less configurable (though it is) than KDE maybe but more focused. The fact that is Ubuntu makes troubleshooting so much easier.
I prefer kubntu too, I'm currently on 22.04 LTS or 24.04 LTS depending on the machine.
I don't like the fact that you can't surface the menu with standard cua keyboard shortcuts in dolphin, e.g. alt-v for view. As someone previously using windows this is a step backwards for efficiency.
To a large extent, Ubuntu is the reason there is a Linux community. They did a lot of things right - mailing free installation CDs, having a guide for new users, having a distro that made installation easier on more hardware than any other - but the one revolutionary change was to kill RTFM.
Prior to Ubuntu, Linux was a tool for social misfits to get revenge on everyone else for getting stuffed in lockers in high school. Eric Raymond and his merry band of followers did way more than Microsoft to slow Linux adoption. Ubuntu put an end to that.
Also on the down side, Ubuntu seems to have lost the plot a bit by adding things like advertisements for Ubuntu Pro.
I would like to submit PRs to remove these ads, but of course they would never be accepted.
We've seen where the road of advertisements eventually leads (Windows 11), and it isn't good.
Adding extra garbage into CLI sessions is something that I greatly dislike because 1) it adds distracting noise and 2) it can break scripts. Some non-Canonical offenders include GNU parallel and Apple's cc and c++. I don't like how vim includes political messages either, even for causes that I might otherwise support, simply because it is distracting when I want to concentrate on getting work done. Tools should focus on the task at hand and avoid promotional messaging.
In addition to the direct impact Ubuntu had it also sits at the core of so many other popular distros which de facto standardized setting up and configuring so much consumer Linux software.
Seems like everyone loves to hate Ubuntu lately. From the Amazon search icon years ago, to Snaps, Mir, "pro" updates (which I don't get the backlash about..).
But man, I started using this distro 18 years ago? And I still use it today. I can tell you, it's gotten more usable, more stable, and easier to install, without (imo) sacrificing any of what we love about Linux systems. If you hate snaps you can just remove them.
It's an OS I can easily recommend to beginners who want to dip their toes in the Linux world. They can install it without any help.
And I get that so much is a testament to the software Ubuntu uses getting better. But it brings it all together in such a great way.
I used Arch Linux for a few years. But I didn't really like having to check message boards for any breaking changes before updating lest my system become unusable... As a busy professional and dad, I don't see myself switching off of Ubuntu anytime soon.
You kinda can't, and that's the point people are angry about. I never personally cared one way or the other about snaps. But it is not at all acceptable that Ubuntu will sometimes install a snap when I explicitly use apt to install it. That was the moment I decided I'm not gonna use Ubuntu any more: they started to override my decisions about what to install on my computer, and that isn't ok.
The last time I tried Ubuntu it would automatically install the snap version if I tried to `apt install` a package. Is this behavior easy to disable? Do they even ship apt packages of stuff they use snap for?
apt "pinning" is the process you're looking for. This allows you to prevent reinstallation of snapd and prefer other sources for packages, e.g. Firefox from Mozilla's PPA.
So Ubuntu doesn't provide apt packages so if I want to use apt I have to muck around with PPAs? I don't want to have to add a PPA for every software I install. This is why Debian is better for my use case -- all I have to do is apt install and boom I have the Debian package installed. All this works out of the box on a Debian installation.
Sorry, but this is not true. It's claimed you can use pinning, but at least on my installation, it didn't work no matter what documentation I followed. There was literally no way to stop it from silently switching to the Firefox snap. Well, installing Linux Mint fixed it, but that's not really the same thing.
I'm overall very positive on Ubuntu, but snaps was a big misstep in my opinion. When snaps were rolled out, lots of features were no longer working in apps packaged as snaps, or it was at least confusing to users (like file picker suddenly defaulting to some isolated path). For an operating system that always had a big focus on good user experience, this was really mismanaged and prematurely rolled out. And then they decided to force that bad UX on people by pointing apt packages to snaps suddenly, taking away the users choice to not use snap.
The Amazon search lens was also a mistake, but at least it was easy for "regular" users to disable it. About Mir: so long as everything works, regular users wouldn't even notice, which is fine. I don't like the fragmentation in the Linux landscape, but oh well.
Ubuntu was ahead of its time in usability but things like "They can install it without any help" aren't particularly unique or compelling claims to make 20 years later. In some ways it has went backwards in usability. As an example, you mention snaps: say a user comes to find they don't like dealing with sandboxed apps being delivered via a separate update and package system... can they really "just remove them?". E.g. try removing snapd and Firefox then installing Firefox... it's no longer in the repositories and you're now in the realm of adding custom PPAs just to have a contiguous package system for default apps. By this point users have said "fuck it" and moved on.
If you've already got something going there's probably not enough reason to bother switching things up. If you're doing it as a new user... why not compare to Debian or another Debian-based rather than something radically different in type and focus as Arch?
Ubuntu fully earned a lot of that hate, but I can't deny that it's done a lot of good. It's had a lot of influence on getting people into linux and on other distros. I've still got some early Ubuntu CDs sitting around somewhere.
If you don't like Snap, use a distro that doesn't use Snap. If you pick a Snap distro it's just making your life harder for the sake of being difficult.
This applies to many things in Linux world in addition to Snap:
Yes, but when you just update as you've done many times and then several of the main apps don't work, then it's not a case of 'just pick a non-snap distro' as you already did that. Canonical have been aggressive in changes to snap only, reversing changes that would normally prevent their install. Now they've gone with 'pro', again using the installation system against their users.
When you've used the same distro (Kubuntu for me) for many years, the forced choosing of a different distro with the need to migrate, ... it's like you're back with Microsoft again.
I'm still unpicking the situation because moving ones family to a new OS is hard work (for me).
Ubuntu was never a non-Snap distro. It was always a distribution provided by Canonical wherein they make decisions for you based on their own criteria. Snap became one of those decisions. I can't help but think of "Open Source is Not About You" by Rich Hickey.
If Canonical is, as you say, using Ubuntu _against_ users (and not, in what is much more likely, simply making a decision that you disagree with) why would you want to continue using it? They have root on all your systems via apt.
Personally, I can't wait to try the all-Snap flavor whenever it's ready. I'm curious if it will work for my usage (gaming in particular).
> "pro" updates (which I don't get the backlash about.)
Waving a security update in my face on the premise that I'll pay them more is rather unacceptable. That said, I wish Ubuntu all the best... in the meantime, I'm considering switching to debian for my cloud stuff, hopefully Trixie comes out in decent shape next year...
btw what happened to the fully snap-based atomic version aka Ubuntu Core Desktop? Last news was from February that it got delayed but no news ever since
Once long ago our family Windows computer had a motherboard failure and I convinced my parents to buy just a replacement motherboard in the right shape (maybe processor as well, now that I think about it), and we tried to fix it. While the data on the disk was recovered, we couldn’t get Windows to recognize this as the “same device” so we had to buy a new license. Instead I installed Ubuntu and casually taught my mom how to use it - I figured it was worth a try before buying a license.
She had no problems whatsoever using it for all of her work and barely noticed the change, and it brought new life to a computer that would have almost certainly ended up in a landfill 7 years early.
Given the hard work of the Wine/Proton developers (and many, many others) I can only imagine the situation is even better now.
I think many "average" computer users spend almost all of their time inside a web browser.
I think that apart from MS Office apps (which don't have a good enough alternative, especially for Excel), most of the other apps that people use are already available on linux, either natively, through electron, or as a web app.
A beginner friendly distro like Ubuntu (especially the LTS version) can be ideal for a lot of people. Reducing the bloatware overhead that Windows brings, increasing performance and battery life, adding privacy, and reducing the likelihood of malware.
As a teen I installed dd-wrt on our router. Visiting home about ten years later after college I opened up the gateway address to a nice reminder seeing it was still there. My parents had no need or understanding to change it.
Ubuntu did a lot for the ease-of-access of Linux, and was the gateway for a lot of us.
In the mid-2000s, getting professionally packaged CDs, one for Live Ubuntu and one for installation, with clear instructions, and having that load into an easy to use (relatively, for the time) OS installer, made the prospect of trying out Linux so much easier and more appealing, compared to downloading it on a torrent or trying to find a friend to copy it from. That was right away a positive first impression of Linux, and probably played a part in me continuing to try it out despite many kernel panics in the early days, and then eventually moving to Linux entirely.
And along the way, I've been able to help out many others get into Linux and have an easier time of it as well. None of this might have happened if not for Ubuntu's attitude of actively reaching out to help new users, and the end products of that.
I ordered many CDs of Ubuntu from 2005 until they don't send it anymore. For a middle schooler, getting a package that cool from abroad is something to be proud of. Thanks Ubuntu!
Yes I remember doing the same. I'd probably be about 12 years old, and my dad asked "What is this Ubuntu thing you got in the mail?", even now he asks me about Ubuntu.
Ubuntu was a big factor in me getting into Linux as a kid in India. In an era where the only internet we had was expensive dial-up, Ubuntu shipping CDs all the way here was such a nice act of kindness!
I was even able to evangelize people around me into Linux, since I was able to give away CDs.
Seconding this, I ordered a free 9.04 live CD as a kid and got started by putting it on my personal computer, which had a broken windows install that I wasn't knowledgeable enough to fix (and couldn't afford to reinstall)
The kindness they gave by shipping that CD inspired a lifelong interest in computers in me.
Maybe ten something years ago my dad got a free Ubuntu boot disk somewhere. Curious how he got it because he doesn't work with computers at all lol, but he's a personable person and he meets a lot of people. Knowing I was into computers and programming he gave me the disk. He told me how he loved what "ubuntu" meant: "I am because we are". Ubuntu was my first distro and I am grateful for that.
I just Googled, Warty Warthog was released October 2004. I ordered a free CD of this to my house, as a teen, and installed it — wiping Windows — without a second thought. What followed, after feverishly owning up to breaking the machine (the DSL modem only worked with Windows), was truly the start of my future in technology, computers and software. Ubuntu has stayed constant with me as many, many things have changed over these two decades.
This makes me feel my age... I ordered and got that free CD, and "tested" it on my windows XP laptop, with a dual boot, because this is just a test, right?
I never booted XP again on that laptop, or any other since. For the past 3-4 years I've been planning to get off Ubuntu and move to Arch, but I keep postponing because everything just works, and I can't risk downtime due to something not working as I'm used to.
Lucky you that everything just works. I’ve never had a seamless post install experience with Ubuntu. There’s always some weirdness, some display oddity, some wifi quirk, some sleep/hibernate thing, right click on the trackpad, or installing packages is broken. As much as I love and respect Ubuntu, I just can’t imagine using it for personal work.
And yes, I also installed the first version via CD in 2005, way back when, on my XP machine.
except "that" laptop which was a Toshiba, all the rest of them were Thinkpads. Maybe that's it? My requirements for "just works" change over the years, and maybe at times I was a bit lax (I don't really need a fingerprint reader) but yeah everything so far just worked (including that print reader in recent years).
I still plan to move to Arch because 20 years is a long time and change is inevitable, but I need some free time first...
I remember 2005 when I ordered the Ubuntu CD to the middle of nowhere with just a dial up connection and receiving a package from UK felt like magic. It was my first hands-on experience with GNU/Linux.
Time flies. Things change. "The year of Linux on the desktop" is always next year. I am grateful to Canonical and Mark Shuttleworth for all their work that was done back then. For a lot of people, Ubuntu became their entrypoint to the world of open source, tinkering and Linux ecosystem.
NixOS really makes Ubuntu (and all the other distros) feel old though. I mean I _love_ Ubuntu, and I’ve used it faithfully for 12 years, but once you get used to Nix, and granted, it’s tough, but it’s just an absolute revelation in terms of confidence in one’s operating system, freedom to use so much more software, and not be worried about even very advanced configs. I could never go back.
I still have my official 4.10 Live CD. As a total oblivious person about the Linux world back then that was one of the biggest technology epiphany for me. Such a small thing yet it was just so mind blowing to run a full functioning OS from a disk that works everywhere (almost) in a "non-destructive" way. I've felt like a king to have my own OS with my own stuff on the locked down school computers. It was like finally I could do everything and it was thanks to Ubuntu
(even though I know since that Ubuntu wasn't the first Live distro at all)
Ubuntu has been my favorite distro since I first tried it from one of the CDs ages ago. It was probably 5.04 or 6.06. I've used it off and on since then on desktops and servers. Since the middle of 2022 I started using it in place of Windows for PC gaming and it's been (mostly) a dream come true - I can finally use a reasonable OS to run my games.
It's sad to see so many Linux people try to tear Ubuntu/Canonical down over minor technical complaints (snaps are fine, Unity was good) since they've done so much for Desktop Linux in particular. I hope the distro will keep going strong for another 20 years as I have no desire to switch to another.
I've used Ubuntu on servers for probably the last twelve or so years. Mostly the reason is that it's the path of the least resistance. Most software that has installation documentation for Linux will document Ubuntu first. Maybe Red Hat and then you are on your own. So, getting stuff running on it tends to be well documented, well supported, etc.
For personal use, I've moved away from it. I've had a Manjaro laptop for a few years now for some light gaming on Steam, which works great. I picked an Arch based distro because that's what Steam uses for the Steam Deck.
IMHO, Ubuntu should move to rolling releases if they want to stay relevant. It doesn't make sense to run years out of date kernels and software packages these days. Especially if you want to run e.g. games and benefit from driver upgrades. And the bi-annual upgrade cycle just creates a lot of hassle for users. I know lots of Ubuntu users that routinely wipe their laptop because it's just easier than upgrading. Not a thing with Manjaro. I installed it nearly three years ago and it's fully up to date. And there seems to be a steady flow of kernel work that has gradually improved support for the hardware I have. I wouldn't want to miss out on that.
Now that Arch has a more usable installer, I might move over to that but I'm not in a hurry. Three years ago installing Arch was a 50 step process that was a bit challenging as it involved fiddling with boot loaders and what not just to get it to boot to a cli with a working network connection (which requires the right kernel modules to be there). Manjaro has a nice live CD that sort of makes that a whole lot easier. That sort of makes it the Ubuntu equivalent for Arch, I guess.
I've been using LTS releases for just about everything since 10.04. It's been very stable; the transition through all the init systems wasn't that fun (sysv, upstart, systemd), but it's mostly just always worked. And it's sorta the default for 3rd party software to support first. Congrats to the team.
Ubuntu was my gateway into Linux, to which I'll be forever grateful. I really appreciated, and am doing to this day, the effort to make a nice OOTB Linux experience. I also think that the Ubuntu release names are the best in the Linux world.
I remember getting their free cds when I was in college. At the time I was a user of Conectiva Linux with widowmaker Desktop. Conectiva would later fuse with a french company and became Mandriva.
After sufering a couple of years in slack, I tried ubuntu for the first time and was my go to distro until I foun Fedora. And them I never really leave Fedora, but I still try new Ubuntu and arch from times to times.
I do ernjoy how easy they make everything, and while I understand that people dont like Snaps, they do work well enough for the use I do of a linux desktop.
I also run Ubuntu Server on my home server.
Installed Ubuntu LTS on some family members PCs who use it for web browsing and Libre Office, and they are so happy, they got no issues, and I'm chill because I know they will not get OS ads, auto installed apps, or crap like that. Thanks Canonical. What a solid and user friendly OS.
Will have to go to their homes to change Ublock Origin for the lite version since they use Chrome tho. I think the developer should choose to update the V2 with the V3 on the Chrome Store.
Ubuntu was a godsend when it came out. Linux "just worked" on most hardware out of the box (well, I never did get my wifi driver working, but it was amazing that everything ELSE worked).
Since then, Ubuntu's role in the Linux community has changed. I don't think anyone would seriously recommend Ubuntu to a newbie, when there are so many better options. (And that's okay, things are allowed to change).
Ubuntu was my first experience with linux and my first introduction to free software from around 2011, when I was 13. It changed the game for me, I ended up succeeding in my career so far quite significantly from the Ubuntu introduction to computing
I do wish the canonical hiring process was less goofy, as I think I'm qualified for roles there but I ended the process early years ago and now I don't seem to be under consideration since
I owe Canonical a lot. I don't remember exactly if I had a metered connection when they started sending out CDs, but even if we already upgraded to an unmetered connection, downloading a whole CD would not have been practical.
Was one of the first times to try a usable Linux installation
fair to say it has been worked on much longer than 20 years, but it is a good time to recognize its role in getting people on to the linux ecosystem.
despite running off of a cd and memory, a live ubuntu 10 experience felt faster on my p4 old box than the windows xp installed on a scsi drive. despite the challenges with certain hardware support (broadcom wifi on 12.04; nvidia hybrid mode on laptops especially around 14.04 era), it was a relatively safe environment to learn about the linux internals at my own pace.
from academia to work, i continue to see it being a default choice for linux environments, and for a good reason. happy birthday!
Ubuntu 8.04 was my first daily driver. Got it from an issue of Linux Magazine, back when they used to include live CDs. It kept my laptop from becoming a brick after the Windows Vista installation corrupted itself during a long vacation. Everything just worked!
Came here to say the same. The shipit program relieved a major pain point that prevented me from getting into Linux at the time: dial-up networking. It was a clever idea :)
For all the hate it gets, I for one love Ubuntu. I have been an Ubuntu user since 16.04, and it's the distro that taught me the most about Linux. Thank you Canonical. You guys are amazing!
Ubuntu was really revolutionary and helped me bring hundreds or maybe thousands of people to Linux years ago. I wish they would still have the power to push things further and do the same to mobile.
Ubuntu seems to have lost the plot a bit adding things like advertisements for Ubuntu Pro.
This kind of nonsense is one of the things that people hate about Windows.
Also adding extra garbage into CLI sessions is something that I greatly dislike because 1) it's very irritating and adds unnecessary noise and 2) it can break scripts. Some non-Canonical offenders include GNU parallel and Apple's xcode CLI tools. I don't like how vim includes political messages either, even for causes that I might otherwise support, simply because it is distracting when I want to concentrate on getting work done.
once per user per machine, which means it's basically unusable in scripts you share ir use in CI.
I avoid it for that reason. For simple cases, I use xargs; and for complex, small (stdlib-only) python scripts - they are a bit more verbose but infinitely easier to debug and improve.
Am surprised you're being downvoted. What you've described is in a nutshell why I don't use Ubuntu -- and why I stick with vanilla Debian instead. I left Windows to get away from certain things such as irritating advertisements and the like.
I dislike Ubuntu, but I'm glad it exists. It gives more normie-adjacent people an alternative to frickin' Windows. And it gives the "year of the Linux desktop" crowd a project to base their efforts on leaving me in peace with my command-line-heavy, systemd-free, GNOME-free distros.
I like Ubuntu but I feel like Linux for the everyday user is still far away. Like on laptops battery life and sleep behavior is still not great. Does Canonical maintain a list of things they want to fix that would make it a true viable OS for users who aren’t enthusiasts?
I remember the live cds and install cds that were free to order. Brought life back to an old g3 iMac and it taught me much about grub bootloader to dual boot. Was also an early teen too.
20 years later and I knew I’ll be in tech. I’m 50/50 about that.
My first distributor was either mandrake or suse. But this was the one I used the most. The other exciting thing at the time was knoppix.
Remember how it was called "linux for human beings". Now, not so much, I tried it recently and it's clear that desktop users aren't their current audience any-more.
I'm sure lots of people have lots of thoughts on them, but personally I'd like to give a shout out to Canonical. At least from my perspective in the early days of DigitalOcean the few interactions I did have with them were super positive, they seemed to really want us to win. I'll always have a soft spot Ubuntu and as far as community stewards go, on average Mark Shuttleworth has been good. Thanks Ubuntu Community! Thanks Mark! Thanks Canonical!
To me Ubuntu is what Mandrake never became.
Ubuntu was leaps ahead of Mandrake at least in installation friendliness, which, let's face it - is often the biggest hurdle getting people interested. The installer wasn't bad, but kinda threw you to the wolves wrt partitioning and such. As a novice, I had no idea what this meant.
Ubuntu came along and made it easy. A live bootable image to play with and see work, and an installer that just let you click through and let it do the dirty work without me having to know what I was doing. That went a long way, and IIRC was the first of its kind to take this approach.
I'd honestly still be using it today if not for snaps. I generally don't like tinkering and optimizing, much preferring to just get something working quickly and out of my way.
I don't recall Mandrake being particularly difficult, although it's been a long time and I don't remember much details, but it was my first Linux distro back in the day. From what I recall, the installation was very similar to Ubuntu(?) I guess my memory of things must be wrong.
Might be interesting to get a hold of an old Mandrake install CD and try in QEMU.
I do remember I had some problems upgrading Mandrake: after the upgrade I just got gibberish on the screen – some X problems I guess, but I didn't have the skill to debug it at the time. I just reinstalled with FreeBSD (which I had tried before Mandrake, but I couldn't get "xfree86 -configure" to work – the second time I had learned enough from Mandrake to make that work) and didn't look much at Linux for a long time after that.
Came across this. Better than many others, but still a little technical for a newbie IMO.
https://youtu.be/GvFelGwZBcc
Looking at release dates for Mandrake, FreeBSD, and Ubuntu, I think I must have used Mandrake 9.x, or maybe 8.x. I found a video of that: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBpRuXjHTw8 – in a quick watch-though, it seems roughly similar to what I remember of early Ubuntu (actually, in a quick check it seems that very early Ubuntu only had a text installer?)
I think Linux is inherently a bit tricky/hard for a newbie, because unlike Windows or macOS it can't just assume it's going to be the only OS. Installing e.g. Windows isn't necessarily newbie-friendly either – it's just that most people never have to do that.
You can install Gnome Software with one command if you don't like snaps. That's a negligible amount of tinkering for the average Linux user.
You also need to add PPAs to get the non-snap versions of certain applications, like Firefox, since Ubuntu's deb package for it just installs the snap.
This wasn't true the last time I messed with it. I used synaptic to install packages, and many would just install the snap version anyways. Has that changed?
I miss Mandrake, after Slackware, it was my first distro!
I learned linux proper because I ordered a mandrake CD in the mail. I saw a friends Slackware and I presumed it was just a "cooler windows" or something, so I ordered Mandrake, installed it, was like uh oh..oooh shit... this isn't windows at all...!!! But I couldn't figure out how to go back to NTFS so I just learned linux instead ha. Doubt I'd be here today if it was not for Mandrake (and basically hand rolling a modem driver).
I believe Ubuntu has been a positive for the Linux community. While there definitely were distributions before Ubuntu that focused on the user experience (Mandrake Linux and Lindows/Linspire come to mind), there are many people whose first experience with desktop Linux was through Ubuntu. Although I personally prefer FreeBSD for my Unix needs and Debian if I need actual Linux, Ubuntu is the distribution I recommend to those who are coming from Windows or macOS who want to try out desktop Linux. The last few times I used Ubuntu, whether it's on actual hardware or inside a VM, it seems to be reasonably simple to install, has sensible defaults, and supports a wide range of hardware.
Agreed - Ubuntu is the path of least resistance for installing Linux on your laptop or desktop.
But I still appreciate KDE-based Linux environments for their more straightforward, consistent, no-nonsense GUI, which seems to be derived from classic (pre Windows 8) Windows. Another thing that KDE seems to have gotten right is realizing that what makes macOS and Windows useful isn't just the GUI itself but the set of apps that use it and interoperate seamlessly with each other.
Ubuntu seems to have more UI churn than I'd like (even though I prefer Mac-style menu bars, etc.) And Wayland (which KDE has also moved to for better or for worse) has never brought me happiness.
I understand the motivation for Snaps, but I only want them for app store type apps, not for everything.
> But I still appreciate KDE-based Linux environments for their more straightforward, consistent, no-nonsense GUI, which seems to be derived from classic (pre Windows 8) Windows. Another thing that KDE seems to have gotten right is realizing that what makes macOS and Windows useful isn't just the GUI itself but the set of apps that use it and interoperate seamlessly with each other.
I am deeply confused by this passage. KDE takes a much less staunch top-down development approach than Gnome, which means that every KDE application, and sometimes even with the KDE GUI, things are done their own way. It makes for a very disjointed experience when UI/UX patterns don't transfer between applications.
Its why I always end up switching back to Gnome, despite deeply disliking the flipside of the Gnome team's attitude. For example, it is beyond me why they haven't integrated Dock-to-Dash, Tiling Assistant and Night Theme Switcher. Especially Dash-to-Dock is so vastly popular that I reckon there's more people running Gnome with rather than without.
That the GNOME team is notorious for regularly breaking their ABI compatibility between upgrades _is_ the issue.
Why do they do that?
When was the last time you used KDE? Cause this time around that hasn't been my experience at all, it's gnome that's currently really disjointed with random hamburger menus and whitespace everywhere.
Current KDE feels like the most well put together DE I've ever used, and its really efficient once I get my custom keybinds in there.
> When was the last time you used KDE?
Half a year ago, thereabouts?
And no, Gnome is not inconsistent. I just opened a bunch of applications, and they either have a hamburger menu on the top left or top right, mostly with the same options list and "About" at the bottom of the list. There is some slight visual difference between GTK4 applications and GTK3 applications that are yet to have a rewrite, but it is very consistent. Which does comes with the aforementioned problem of the Gnome devs being very "my way or the highway".
In a strange way KDE reminds me of Windows, where the application devs always seem to be using 3-4 different frameworks, 3-4 different installers, and none of them try to get more than broad consistency between eachother.
I did say in my experience, whereas you seem to be speaking in absolutes.
Either way I disagree with you. I think we have differing opinions of what good actually is, and gnome just isn't good anymore to me. Best of luck to you though.
I personally started with Mint and that's what I would recommend. It's "straightforward, consistent, no-nonsense" and works out of the box. Cinnamon is less configurable (though it is) than KDE maybe but more focused. The fact that is Ubuntu makes troubleshooting so much easier.
We have Kubuntu for that
EDIT: for stupid downvoters - Kubuntu is an official Ubuntu variant. It is officially part of the Ubuntu project. https://kubuntu.org
I prefer kubntu too, I'm currently on 22.04 LTS or 24.04 LTS depending on the machine.
I don't like the fact that you can't surface the menu with standard cua keyboard shortcuts in dolphin, e.g. alt-v for view. As someone previously using windows this is a step backwards for efficiency.
Depends on the individual. I don't use those shortcuts on Windows either.
I almost never need the menus. I set the view settings globally, applied to all folders.
There are keyboard shortcuts for actions within those menus, like cut/copy/paste. The shortcuts are more configurable than on Windows.
F4 opens a terminal in the current directory
That's all I use 99.99% of the time
To a large extent, Ubuntu is the reason there is a Linux community. They did a lot of things right - mailing free installation CDs, having a guide for new users, having a distro that made installation easier on more hardware than any other - but the one revolutionary change was to kill RTFM.
Prior to Ubuntu, Linux was a tool for social misfits to get revenge on everyone else for getting stuffed in lockers in high school. Eric Raymond and his merry band of followers did way more than Microsoft to slow Linux adoption. Ubuntu put an end to that.
Also on the down side, Ubuntu seems to have lost the plot a bit by adding things like advertisements for Ubuntu Pro.
I would like to submit PRs to remove these ads, but of course they would never be accepted.
We've seen where the road of advertisements eventually leads (Windows 11), and it isn't good.
Adding extra garbage into CLI sessions is something that I greatly dislike because 1) it adds distracting noise and 2) it can break scripts. Some non-Canonical offenders include GNU parallel and Apple's cc and c++. I don't like how vim includes political messages either, even for causes that I might otherwise support, simply because it is distracting when I want to concentrate on getting work done. Tools should focus on the task at hand and avoid promotional messaging.
In addition to the direct impact Ubuntu had it also sits at the core of so many other popular distros which de facto standardized setting up and configuring so much consumer Linux software.
Seems like everyone loves to hate Ubuntu lately. From the Amazon search icon years ago, to Snaps, Mir, "pro" updates (which I don't get the backlash about..).
But man, I started using this distro 18 years ago? And I still use it today. I can tell you, it's gotten more usable, more stable, and easier to install, without (imo) sacrificing any of what we love about Linux systems. If you hate snaps you can just remove them.
It's an OS I can easily recommend to beginners who want to dip their toes in the Linux world. They can install it without any help.
And I get that so much is a testament to the software Ubuntu uses getting better. But it brings it all together in such a great way.
I used Arch Linux for a few years. But I didn't really like having to check message boards for any breaking changes before updating lest my system become unusable... As a busy professional and dad, I don't see myself switching off of Ubuntu anytime soon.
> If you hate snaps you can just remove them.
You kinda can't, and that's the point people are angry about. I never personally cared one way or the other about snaps. But it is not at all acceptable that Ubuntu will sometimes install a snap when I explicitly use apt to install it. That was the moment I decided I'm not gonna use Ubuntu any more: they started to override my decisions about what to install on my computer, and that isn't ok.
> If you hate snaps you can just remove them.
The last time I tried Ubuntu it would automatically install the snap version if I tried to `apt install` a package. Is this behavior easy to disable? Do they even ship apt packages of stuff they use snap for?
apt "pinning" is the process you're looking for. This allows you to prevent reinstallation of snapd and prefer other sources for packages, e.g. Firefox from Mozilla's PPA.
So Ubuntu doesn't provide apt packages so if I want to use apt I have to muck around with PPAs? I don't want to have to add a PPA for every software I install. This is why Debian is better for my use case -- all I have to do is apt install and boom I have the Debian package installed. All this works out of the box on a Debian installation.
Sorry, but this is not true. It's claimed you can use pinning, but at least on my installation, it didn't work no matter what documentation I followed. There was literally no way to stop it from silently switching to the Firefox snap. Well, installing Linux Mint fixed it, but that's not really the same thing.
nope, for major things like Firefox, it's either snaps or third-party repos.
I'm overall very positive on Ubuntu, but snaps was a big misstep in my opinion. When snaps were rolled out, lots of features were no longer working in apps packaged as snaps, or it was at least confusing to users (like file picker suddenly defaulting to some isolated path). For an operating system that always had a big focus on good user experience, this was really mismanaged and prematurely rolled out. And then they decided to force that bad UX on people by pointing apt packages to snaps suddenly, taking away the users choice to not use snap.
The Amazon search lens was also a mistake, but at least it was easy for "regular" users to disable it. About Mir: so long as everything works, regular users wouldn't even notice, which is fine. I don't like the fragmentation in the Linux landscape, but oh well.
Ubuntu was ahead of its time in usability but things like "They can install it without any help" aren't particularly unique or compelling claims to make 20 years later. In some ways it has went backwards in usability. As an example, you mention snaps: say a user comes to find they don't like dealing with sandboxed apps being delivered via a separate update and package system... can they really "just remove them?". E.g. try removing snapd and Firefox then installing Firefox... it's no longer in the repositories and you're now in the realm of adding custom PPAs just to have a contiguous package system for default apps. By this point users have said "fuck it" and moved on.
If you've already got something going there's probably not enough reason to bother switching things up. If you're doing it as a new user... why not compare to Debian or another Debian-based rather than something radically different in type and focus as Arch?
Ubuntu fully earned a lot of that hate, but I can't deny that it's done a lot of good. It's had a lot of influence on getting people into linux and on other distros. I've still got some early Ubuntu CDs sitting around somewhere.
> If you hate snaps you can just remove them.
lol.
ubuntu makes it really hard for you to regain control of their system.
https://askubuntu.com/questions/1035915/how-to-remove-snap-f...
https://askubuntu.com/questions/1322292/how-do-i-turn-off-au...
https://askubuntu.com/questions/676374/how-to-disable-welcom...
https://askubuntu.com/questions/1434512/how-to-get-rid-of-ub...
If you don't like Snap, use a distro that doesn't use Snap. If you pick a Snap distro it's just making your life harder for the sake of being difficult.
This applies to many things in Linux world in addition to Snap:
- systemd/sysvinit
- Wayland/X
- apt/rpm
- Musl/glibc
Yes, but when you just update as you've done many times and then several of the main apps don't work, then it's not a case of 'just pick a non-snap distro' as you already did that. Canonical have been aggressive in changes to snap only, reversing changes that would normally prevent their install. Now they've gone with 'pro', again using the installation system against their users.
When you've used the same distro (Kubuntu for me) for many years, the forced choosing of a different distro with the need to migrate, ... it's like you're back with Microsoft again.
I'm still unpicking the situation because moving ones family to a new OS is hard work (for me).
Ubuntu was never a non-Snap distro. It was always a distribution provided by Canonical wherein they make decisions for you based on their own criteria. Snap became one of those decisions. I can't help but think of "Open Source is Not About You" by Rich Hickey.
If Canonical is, as you say, using Ubuntu _against_ users (and not, in what is much more likely, simply making a decision that you disagree with) why would you want to continue using it? They have root on all your systems via apt.
Personally, I can't wait to try the all-Snap flavor whenever it's ready. I'm curious if it will work for my usage (gaming in particular).
> "pro" updates (which I don't get the backlash about.)
Waving a security update in my face on the premise that I'll pay them more is rather unacceptable. That said, I wish Ubuntu all the best... in the meantime, I'm considering switching to debian for my cloud stuff, hopefully Trixie comes out in decent shape next year...
btw what happened to the fully snap-based atomic version aka Ubuntu Core Desktop? Last news was from February that it got delayed but no news ever since
Once long ago our family Windows computer had a motherboard failure and I convinced my parents to buy just a replacement motherboard in the right shape (maybe processor as well, now that I think about it), and we tried to fix it. While the data on the disk was recovered, we couldn’t get Windows to recognize this as the “same device” so we had to buy a new license. Instead I installed Ubuntu and casually taught my mom how to use it - I figured it was worth a try before buying a license.
She had no problems whatsoever using it for all of her work and barely noticed the change, and it brought new life to a computer that would have almost certainly ended up in a landfill 7 years early.
Given the hard work of the Wine/Proton developers (and many, many others) I can only imagine the situation is even better now.
I think many "average" computer users spend almost all of their time inside a web browser.
I think that apart from MS Office apps (which don't have a good enough alternative, especially for Excel), most of the other apps that people use are already available on linux, either natively, through electron, or as a web app.
A beginner friendly distro like Ubuntu (especially the LTS version) can be ideal for a lot of people. Reducing the bloatware overhead that Windows brings, increasing performance and battery life, adding privacy, and reducing the likelihood of malware.
As a teen I installed dd-wrt on our router. Visiting home about ten years later after college I opened up the gateway address to a nice reminder seeing it was still there. My parents had no need or understanding to change it.
Ubuntu did a lot for the ease-of-access of Linux, and was the gateway for a lot of us.
In the mid-2000s, getting professionally packaged CDs, one for Live Ubuntu and one for installation, with clear instructions, and having that load into an easy to use (relatively, for the time) OS installer, made the prospect of trying out Linux so much easier and more appealing, compared to downloading it on a torrent or trying to find a friend to copy it from. That was right away a positive first impression of Linux, and probably played a part in me continuing to try it out despite many kernel panics in the early days, and then eventually moving to Linux entirely.
And along the way, I've been able to help out many others get into Linux and have an easier time of it as well. None of this might have happened if not for Ubuntu's attitude of actively reaching out to help new users, and the end products of that.
I ordered many CDs of Ubuntu from 2005 until they don't send it anymore. For a middle schooler, getting a package that cool from abroad is something to be proud of. Thanks Ubuntu!
Ayy, I did the same in high school in the 2000s. It was most if not all the mail I got back then and it felt special.
Yes I remember doing the same. I'd probably be about 12 years old, and my dad asked "What is this Ubuntu thing you got in the mail?", even now he asks me about Ubuntu.
My first one was the Red package, then the orange
Congrats Ubuntu!
Ubuntu was a big factor in me getting into Linux as a kid in India. In an era where the only internet we had was expensive dial-up, Ubuntu shipping CDs all the way here was such a nice act of kindness!
I was even able to evangelize people around me into Linux, since I was able to give away CDs.
Seconding this, I ordered a free 9.04 live CD as a kid and got started by putting it on my personal computer, which had a broken windows install that I wasn't knowledgeable enough to fix (and couldn't afford to reinstall)
The kindness they gave by shipping that CD inspired a lifelong interest in computers in me.
Maybe ten something years ago my dad got a free Ubuntu boot disk somewhere. Curious how he got it because he doesn't work with computers at all lol, but he's a personable person and he meets a lot of people. Knowing I was into computers and programming he gave me the disk. He told me how he loved what "ubuntu" meant: "I am because we are". Ubuntu was my first distro and I am grateful for that.
I just Googled, Warty Warthog was released October 2004. I ordered a free CD of this to my house, as a teen, and installed it — wiping Windows — without a second thought. What followed, after feverishly owning up to breaking the machine (the DSL modem only worked with Windows), was truly the start of my future in technology, computers and software. Ubuntu has stayed constant with me as many, many things have changed over these two decades.
This makes me feel my age... I ordered and got that free CD, and "tested" it on my windows XP laptop, with a dual boot, because this is just a test, right? I never booted XP again on that laptop, or any other since. For the past 3-4 years I've been planning to get off Ubuntu and move to Arch, but I keep postponing because everything just works, and I can't risk downtime due to something not working as I'm used to.
Lucky you that everything just works. I’ve never had a seamless post install experience with Ubuntu. There’s always some weirdness, some display oddity, some wifi quirk, some sleep/hibernate thing, right click on the trackpad, or installing packages is broken. As much as I love and respect Ubuntu, I just can’t imagine using it for personal work.
And yes, I also installed the first version via CD in 2005, way back when, on my XP machine.
except "that" laptop which was a Toshiba, all the rest of them were Thinkpads. Maybe that's it? My requirements for "just works" change over the years, and maybe at times I was a bit lax (I don't really need a fingerprint reader) but yeah everything so far just worked (including that print reader in recent years). I still plan to move to Arch because 20 years is a long time and change is inevitable, but I need some free time first...
I remember 2005 when I ordered the Ubuntu CD to the middle of nowhere with just a dial up connection and receiving a package from UK felt like magic. It was my first hands-on experience with GNU/Linux.
Time flies. Things change. "The year of Linux on the desktop" is always next year. I am grateful to Canonical and Mark Shuttleworth for all their work that was done back then. For a lot of people, Ubuntu became their entrypoint to the world of open source, tinkering and Linux ecosystem.
NixOS really makes Ubuntu (and all the other distros) feel old though. I mean I _love_ Ubuntu, and I’ve used it faithfully for 12 years, but once you get used to Nix, and granted, it’s tough, but it’s just an absolute revelation in terms of confidence in one’s operating system, freedom to use so much more software, and not be worried about even very advanced configs. I could never go back.
I've always thought that NixOS is a new distro because of the recent hype, but apparently it is older (by about a year) than Ubuntu!
I still have my official 4.10 Live CD. As a total oblivious person about the Linux world back then that was one of the biggest technology epiphany for me. Such a small thing yet it was just so mind blowing to run a full functioning OS from a disk that works everywhere (almost) in a "non-destructive" way. I've felt like a king to have my own OS with my own stuff on the locked down school computers. It was like finally I could do everything and it was thanks to Ubuntu
(even though I know since that Ubuntu wasn't the first Live distro at all)
Ubuntu has been my favorite distro since I first tried it from one of the CDs ages ago. It was probably 5.04 or 6.06. I've used it off and on since then on desktops and servers. Since the middle of 2022 I started using it in place of Windows for PC gaming and it's been (mostly) a dream come true - I can finally use a reasonable OS to run my games.
It's sad to see so many Linux people try to tear Ubuntu/Canonical down over minor technical complaints (snaps are fine, Unity was good) since they've done so much for Desktop Linux in particular. I hope the distro will keep going strong for another 20 years as I have no desire to switch to another.
I've used Ubuntu on servers for probably the last twelve or so years. Mostly the reason is that it's the path of the least resistance. Most software that has installation documentation for Linux will document Ubuntu first. Maybe Red Hat and then you are on your own. So, getting stuff running on it tends to be well documented, well supported, etc.
For personal use, I've moved away from it. I've had a Manjaro laptop for a few years now for some light gaming on Steam, which works great. I picked an Arch based distro because that's what Steam uses for the Steam Deck.
IMHO, Ubuntu should move to rolling releases if they want to stay relevant. It doesn't make sense to run years out of date kernels and software packages these days. Especially if you want to run e.g. games and benefit from driver upgrades. And the bi-annual upgrade cycle just creates a lot of hassle for users. I know lots of Ubuntu users that routinely wipe their laptop because it's just easier than upgrading. Not a thing with Manjaro. I installed it nearly three years ago and it's fully up to date. And there seems to be a steady flow of kernel work that has gradually improved support for the hardware I have. I wouldn't want to miss out on that.
Now that Arch has a more usable installer, I might move over to that but I'm not in a hurry. Three years ago installing Arch was a 50 step process that was a bit challenging as it involved fiddling with boot loaders and what not just to get it to boot to a cli with a working network connection (which requires the right kernel modules to be there). Manjaro has a nice live CD that sort of makes that a whole lot easier. That sort of makes it the Ubuntu equivalent for Arch, I guess.
I've been using LTS releases for just about everything since 10.04. It's been very stable; the transition through all the init systems wasn't that fun (sysv, upstart, systemd), but it's mostly just always worked. And it's sorta the default for 3rd party software to support first. Congrats to the team.
Ubuntu was my gateway into Linux, to which I'll be forever grateful. I really appreciated, and am doing to this day, the effort to make a nice OOTB Linux experience. I also think that the Ubuntu release names are the best in the Linux world.
I remember getting their free cds when I was in college. At the time I was a user of Conectiva Linux with widowmaker Desktop. Conectiva would later fuse with a french company and became Mandriva.
After sufering a couple of years in slack, I tried ubuntu for the first time and was my go to distro until I foun Fedora. And them I never really leave Fedora, but I still try new Ubuntu and arch from times to times.
I do ernjoy how easy they make everything, and while I understand that people dont like Snaps, they do work well enough for the use I do of a linux desktop. I also run Ubuntu Server on my home server.
Apply for a job at canonical and get back to me.
I have to agree here. My experience with Canonical's job application process has significantly lowered my opinion of them.
A few people here seem rather down on this process, but without giving any detail. What in particular is unpleasant about such job applications?
This discussion is a good place to start: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39750181
I interviewed with them maybe 8 years ago and it seemed like a pretty typical interview process. Has that changed in the years since?
One of the reasons I keep away from Ubuntu - only desperate people might be willing to work at Canonical.
Installed Ubuntu LTS on some family members PCs who use it for web browsing and Libre Office, and they are so happy, they got no issues, and I'm chill because I know they will not get OS ads, auto installed apps, or crap like that. Thanks Canonical. What a solid and user friendly OS.
Will have to go to their homes to change Ublock Origin for the lite version since they use Chrome tho. I think the developer should choose to update the V2 with the V3 on the Chrome Store.
Ubuntu was a godsend when it came out. Linux "just worked" on most hardware out of the box (well, I never did get my wifi driver working, but it was amazing that everything ELSE worked).
Since then, Ubuntu's role in the Linux community has changed. I don't think anyone would seriously recommend Ubuntu to a newbie, when there are so many better options. (And that's okay, things are allowed to change).
Ubuntu was my first experience with linux and my first introduction to free software from around 2011, when I was 13. It changed the game for me, I ended up succeeding in my career so far quite significantly from the Ubuntu introduction to computing
I do wish the canonical hiring process was less goofy, as I think I'm qualified for roles there but I ended the process early years ago and now I don't seem to be under consideration since
I owe Canonical a lot. I don't remember exactly if I had a metered connection when they started sending out CDs, but even if we already upgraded to an unmetered connection, downloading a whole CD would not have been practical.
Was one of the first times to try a usable Linux installation
fair to say it has been worked on much longer than 20 years, but it is a good time to recognize its role in getting people on to the linux ecosystem.
despite running off of a cd and memory, a live ubuntu 10 experience felt faster on my p4 old box than the windows xp installed on a scsi drive. despite the challenges with certain hardware support (broadcom wifi on 12.04; nvidia hybrid mode on laptops especially around 14.04 era), it was a relatively safe environment to learn about the linux internals at my own pace.
from academia to work, i continue to see it being a default choice for linux environments, and for a good reason. happy birthday!
Canonical have been going downhill since 2012-2014 From 2004 to 2008 they were game changing.
Their hiring process absolutely sucks. Crap hiring processes means you hire people that don't have other options.
Ubuntu 8.04 was my first daily driver. Got it from an issue of Linux Magazine, back when they used to include live CDs. It kept my laptop from becoming a brick after the Windows Vista installation corrupted itself during a long vacation. Everything just worked!
My first Linux distro. I think Ubuntu helped a lot of us, Windows users, to migrate to Linux.
I went Ubuntu in 2006 and haven't looked back.
Hopefully it'll be around for many more years.
I still have all the CDs from the shipit program - such a great project.
Came here to say the same. The shipit program relieved a major pain point that prevented me from getting into Linux at the time: dial-up networking. It was a clever idea :)
My first distro. Not currently using it, but I'll always recommend it for new Linux users as a gateway distro
We've had our differences but I am glad you exist. You are a net positive in the world. Cumple años feliz.
I use Ubuntu myself. Happy birthday to this great distro: you’ve done a lot of good in the world.
For all the hate it gets, I for one love Ubuntu. I have been an Ubuntu user since 16.04, and it's the distro that taught me the most about Linux. Thank you Canonical. You guys are amazing!
happy birthday ubuntu.
a distro I liked in the past and now try to avoid whenever possible.
Ubuntu was really revolutionary and helped me bring hundreds or maybe thousands of people to Linux years ago. I wish they would still have the power to push things further and do the same to mobile.
A happy user since 5.04! A happy Debian user prior to that.
Ubuntu seems to have lost the plot a bit adding things like advertisements for Ubuntu Pro.
This kind of nonsense is one of the things that people hate about Windows.
Also adding extra garbage into CLI sessions is something that I greatly dislike because 1) it's very irritating and adds unnecessary noise and 2) it can break scripts. Some non-Canonical offenders include GNU parallel and Apple's xcode CLI tools. I don't like how vim includes political messages either, even for causes that I might otherwise support, simply because it is distracting when I want to concentrate on getting work done.
>I don't like how vim includes political messages either
Aside from the part where you can explicitly `:help uganda`, I can't fathom what you might be referring to.
GNU parallel asks you to acknowledge its license once, IIRC? Doesn’t seem like that big of an ask.
once per user per machine, which means it's basically unusable in scripts you share ir use in CI.
I avoid it for that reason. For simple cases, I use xargs; and for complex, small (stdlib-only) python scripts - they are a bit more verbose but infinitely easier to debug and improve.
Am surprised you're being downvoted. What you've described is in a nutshell why I don't use Ubuntu -- and why I stick with vanilla Debian instead. I left Windows to get away from certain things such as irritating advertisements and the like.
I remember using my schools high speed internet to download 4.04 since all I had was dial up.
Went home and put it on my old crappy laptop dual boot, had barely any drive space left since it was like 60gb drive at the time lmao.
I am always thankful I got into Linux since it made learning programming so much easier, and my current career involves Linux every day...
I dislike Ubuntu, but I'm glad it exists. It gives more normie-adjacent people an alternative to frickin' Windows. And it gives the "year of the Linux desktop" crowd a project to base their efforts on leaving me in peace with my command-line-heavy, systemd-free, GNOME-free distros.
I like Ubuntu but I feel like Linux for the everyday user is still far away. Like on laptops battery life and sleep behavior is still not great. Does Canonical maintain a list of things they want to fix that would make it a true viable OS for users who aren’t enthusiasts?
Can’t believe it.
I remember the live cds and install cds that were free to order. Brought life back to an old g3 iMac and it taught me much about grub bootloader to dual boot. Was also an early teen too.
20 years later and I knew I’ll be in tech. I’m 50/50 about that.
My first distributor was either mandrake or suse. But this was the one I used the most. The other exciting thing at the time was knoppix.
Ubuntu!
SchoolTool also started 20 years ago. Then Open edX, and it looks like e.g. Canvas for LMS these days.
To run an Ubuntu container with podman:
GitHub Codespaces are Ubuntu devcontainers (codespaces-linux)Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) installs Ubuntu (otherwise there's GitBash and podman-desktop for over there)
The jupyter/docker-stacks containers build FROM Ubuntu:24.04 LTS: https://github.com/jupyter/docker-stacks/blob/main/images/do... :
Remember how it was called "linux for human beings". Now, not so much, I tried it recently and it's clear that desktop users aren't their current audience any-more.
I've been using it exclusively as my main OS for years with no issues. All hardware supported (better than Windows), fast and works out of the box.
It's my favorite Linux distro precisely because it is very easy to use and install.