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Simon Willison’s Weblog

Enter the hedgehog

The Ubuntu community have released Hoary Hedgehog, otherwise known as Ubuntu 5.04. If you haven’t tried Ubuntu yet, it’s an excellent Linux distribution based on Debian with a strong focus on desktop usability. Unlike most Linux distros, Ubuntu comes with just one desktop manager (Gnome) and one obvious default application for each of the essentials: Firefox for browsing, OpenOffice for office work, Evolution for mail.

That’s not to say that other applications aren’t available. Ubuntu’s package management inherits from Debian, with the Synaptic package manager making downloading and installing new software as easy as searching for what you want and hitting a button. The key thing is that you don’t have to start your journey with Linux by making random decisions (Gnome v.s. KDE for example). Ubuntu has more in common with Python’s philosophy (There should be one-- and preferably only one --obvious way to do it) than Perl’s.

Best of all, Ubuntu has a Live CD similar to Knoppix which allows you to try out the distribution without installing a thing—just drop the live CD in to the drive on a x86 PC and reboot.

You can grab Ubuntu from a regional mirror. Torrent files are available for both the install and Live CDs.

Posted 8th April 2005 at 9:49 am

This is Enter the hedgehog by Simon Willison, posted on 8th April 2005.

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13 comments

  1. Have you tried the PPC version on your Powerbook?

    Elmo - 8th April 2005 12:04 - #

  2. But they have horribly mutilated Nautilus. One week before release. It is now the absolute worst file management experience known to man. Unbeleivable.

    rjw - 8th April 2005 13:12 - #

  3. A live CD eh? Might have to give it a go. I haven't played with an alternative OS for ages - I think the last one was QNX a couple of years back, and it was quite nice. Didn't do quite what I wanted though. BTW, is that the rjw of dynamite.org fame?

    Olly - 8th April 2005 13:23 - #

  4. Note that there's also Kubuntu, which uses KDE instead of Gnome.

    Adrian Holovaty - 8th April 2005 15:36 - #

  5. Wow, I didn't know that Ubuntu had a live distro. I've been hearing good things about it, but the synopsis above just convinced me that I need to download an ISO. Thanks, Simon. :)

    Scott Johnson - 8th April 2005 16:30 - #

  6. This is not totally obvious (at least I had to consult Google to figure it out), but there are DVD images, too, including torrents: http://cdimage.ubuntulinux.org/dvd/current/

    These are combined install/live DVDs, by the way.

    Matthias Andreas Benkard - 8th April 2005 18:20 - #

  7. When I read the title of this post, I thought it was going to be about porn star Ron "The Hedgehog" Jeremy. I'm relieved.

    Jordan - 8th April 2005 20:18 - #

  8. That's the right way for GNU/Linux distributions - to include only one application for each work. Users doesn't need three browsers, five text editors and two word processors. But Ubuntu isn't for me. I prefer KDE not GNOME. Besides I don't like Debian-based distros (I use Gentoo).

    Kristaps Kaupe - 8th April 2005 21:55 - #

  9. I believe it is worth mentioning that they have a shipping service too.

    Luiz Rocha - 9th April 2005 02:07 - #

  10. Been using Ubuntu (WARTY) at home, very happily, since last November. Upgrading right now.

    It's actually hard to define why exactly Ubuntu is better than any other desktop distro I've tried but probably the number 1 issue is simply that it doesn't waste my time. In an ideal world I'd probably go with Gentoo or even go the path of "Linux from Scratch" and get exactly what I want but free time is a scarce resource. Ubuntu fills a gap that I think had long time Linux users buying MACs.

    While it doesn't necessarily have "hacker cred" and provokes responses like "not KDE" or "But they have horribly mutilated Nautilus", if you're prepared to accept the choices they've made, which to me are all smart choices, it's a distro you don't have to screw around with.

    More interesting is my daughter (almost 2) loves the Ubuntu boot up, which prompts clapping and laughing. That's compared to Win32 on another system which provokes keyboard bashing.

    Harry Fuecks - 10th April 2005 14:11 - #

  11. I've been using Kubuntu for a few weeks now, and it's mostly been very good. Before that, I was running a HDD install of Knoppix, but the Ubuntu Universe distribution makes keeping everything up-to-date so much easier, although some of the things I use on an everyday basis (in particular Synergy http://synergy2.sourceforge.net ) are at fairly old and bugridden versions.

    Matthew Pettitt - 11th April 2005 12:06 - #

  12. Sounds interesting, I might give one of the images a whirl.

    Robert Wellock - 11th April 2005 14:13 - #

  13. I thought it was gonna be about Ron Jeremy as well ;-) I've just asked Norman (http://norman.rasmussen.org/) what he thought and he reckon's it's the dogs bollocks, so when I get back from holiday, that little 'ol 486 is gonna get Ubuntu'd with the live CD. I'm same as Harry - I don't care what distro it is, or what comes with it, I just want it to work so that I can work, and without having to fuddle things either ;-) Thanks for the tip Simon.

    Gareth - 12th April 2005 12:49 - #

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