Last week Ubuntu Natty Alpha 3 and its official spin off's have been released. I took a short look at the Ubuntu Natty Alpha 3 screenshot tour, yet wasn't very impressed by Unity. Another reason for me to drop Ubuntu GNU/Linux is the inclusion of yet another worthless Mono trojan app, called Banshee.
This is not a rant, it is just a matter of personal preference. Isn't choice/Freedom a great thing?
Being very impressed by KDE lately a took a look at Kubuntu Natty Alpha 3:
I downloaded the i386 ISO9660 CD-image and wrote it to a USB thumbdrive,
then booted my Acer Aspire 7220 laptop from it and to my surprise
everything just worked (the Alpha2 failed to put a desktop on my screen).
I burned the image to a CD Recordable and booted my Athlon XP based
desktop machine from it.
On this machine I use a Sitecom USB Wireless Nano adapter, based on a
Realtec 8712 chipset with USB interface. For this one I had to download
the Freely available source code of the driver, compile and insmod it,
later a dmks package for Debian was provided.
Since (K)ubuntu Natty comes with Linux 2.6.38, this chipset is supported
out of the box. Update: the issue was solved within 48 hours.
I have the idea that Kubuntu Natty Alpha 3 is very stable for a Alpha,
but it has its issues (it's a Alpha release after all).
I wouldn't recommend GNU/Linux n00bs to install it until the final
release goes gold, yet I most certainly recommend seasoned Kubuntu users
to give it a go.
I truly believe that the final version of Kubuntu 11.04 is a perfect
alternative to Windows 7. It provides a beautiful consistent desktop environment (gtk apps integrate very well since Oxigen-gtk is installed by default) and is extremely user friendly.
My main goal for 2011 has become to advocate Kubuntu, install
(eventually as a dualboot with Microsoft Windows) and configure it for
those who are interested at no cost. On Software Freedom Day, I will
give away gratis Kubuntu CD's in the mall, which I live on top off.
Kubuntu 11.04: Hotter then Hell!
