Ubuntu Moves To Yahoo For Default Firefox Search 370
An anonymous reader writes "Starting in Ubuntu's Lucid Lynx release, Firefox's default search engine will be switched from Google to Yahoo. The switch was made after Canonical 'negotiated a revenue sharing deal with Yahoo.' Google will still be available as a choice. Since Yahoo search is now powered by Microsoft's Bing, this would seem to mean that Microsoft will be paying people for using Ubuntu."
Doesn't matter (Score:2, Insightful)
It only takes a couple of clicks to change it to a different engine. Hopefully they won't do anything cute and change it back everytime I upgrade (I'm looking at you Microsoft).
Re:Doesn't matter (Score:5, Informative)
If you want privacy, you are doing it wrong. (Score:3, Informative)
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Where's the catch?
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Re:If you want privacy, you are doing it wrong. (Score:5, Interesting)
As of yet, none.
https://ixquick.com/eng/protect-privacy.html
European Privacy Seal: On July 14th 2008 Ixquick received the first European Privacy Seal from European Data Protection Supervisor Mr. Peter Hustinx. The Seal officially confirms the privacy promises we make to our users. It makes Ixquick the first and only EU-approved search engine. Both EU Commissioner Viviane Reding and Dr.Thilo Weichert, German Privacy Commissioner complemented Ixquick on its privacy achievements.
Certified Secure, a leading Certification Authority, has certified Ixquick's Privacy procedures. The CS Privacy Certificate has been awarded after an extensive audit.
Ixquick has been registered with the Dutch Data Protection Authority (CBP) under number M 1346973. This Authority supervises the fair and lawful use and security of your personal data, to ensure your privacy today and in the future.
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https://ixquick.com/eng/protect-privacy.html
European Privacy Seal: On July 14th 2008 Ixquick received the first European Privacy Seal from European Data Protection Supervisor Mr. Peter Hustinx. The Seal officially confirms the privacy promises we make to our users. It makes Ixquick the first and only EU-approved search engine. Both EU Commissioner Viviane Reding and Dr.Thilo Weichert, German Privacy Commissioner complemented Ixquick on its privacy achievements.
Certified Secure, a leading Certification Aut
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What they are doing is pushing aside a company that has done huge things to support Linux and open source in general in favour of a company that is all about closed proprietary formats and killing off Linux. How long till they start to take the money to force Silverlight down your throat as well?
Of course you aren't ever allowed to say any thing wrong about Ubuntu or Canonical after all the times they have virtually claimed to have invented Linux from scratch.
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That's literally a couple of clicks, ie. two. On Ars Technica the comment thread was full of nerd rage about a change that takes a single second to undo. Even if they did change it on every upgrade it wouldn't be a big deal (though annoying).
Note that the engine WILL change to Yahoo when you upgrade to 10.04 IF you are currently using Google, ie. if you are using the 10.04 default provider. In that case it will upgrade from one default to the next default. Once you are using a custom search provider, it sup
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I don't know; if I had more common sense, I'd probably switch to anything BUT Google since they know decidedly too much about me.
Re:Doesn't matter (Score:4, Insightful)
The OP has this backwards. The money microsoft is paying for this service doesn't come from thin air. They get paid for each and every search thanks to advertisements. What the OP really should of said is, "Ubuntu users provide revenue to Microsoft."
That's right, you're now supporting microsoft by choosing to not use windows, or internet explorer.
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about a change that takes a single second to undo
There's around 8 million Ubuntu users [internetnews.com]. Google has approximately 72.1% (vs 17% for Bing) [blogspot.com]
This means 5,768,000 users will have to change their setting, meaning nearly TWO MONTHS (66.8 days) of lost time overall.
The old way would mean about 15 days of lost time
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I personally continue to use Google for things but mostly out of habit. I'm very impressed with a lot of the things Bing is doing though especially the new recipe search they unveiled and I bet a lot of other used don't care either way.
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There'll be a lot less Ubuntu users if Canonical doesn't find a way to make money. Besides, there are many, many, many ways to optimise a default Ubuntu install in order to safe users one second. Shaving off a quarter second from the boot time will easily offset the time to change the search engine.
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That's literally a couple of clicks, ie. two. On Ars Technica the comment thread was full of nerd rage about a change that takes a single second to undo. Even if they did change it on every upgrade it wouldn't be a big deal (though annoying).
Note that the engine WILL change to Yahoo when you upgrade to 10.04 IF you are currently using Google, ie. if you are using the 10.04 default provider. In that case it will upgrade from one default to the next default. Once you are using a custom search provider, it supposedly won't touch it later.
How technically savvy can these nerds be if they are up in arms with this change?
+1, troll (Score:2)
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So will this be enough of a change for Mozilla to revoke Ubuntu from using the name Firefox like they did to Debian?
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A change in the default from one of the supported search engines to another of the supported search engines?
This isn't a material change to Firefox at all. It's a change to one of the many defaults.
This is actually less invasive than changing the home page to Ubuntu's landing site, or adding all the Ubuntu shortcuts to the bookmarks toolbar. And Firefox has not, to my knowledge, said "boo" about either of those.
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Yes because it's so much better to get people to use Windows, rather than to get them to use Ubuntu, and spend a couple of clicks changing their browser to ... well... some search engine that you prefer. I was going to say Google, but their founders seem to be selling out, so who knows what will become of Google?
I think I know what you're saying though: I guess you've been putting lots of effort into advocating Ubuntu, and now you feel betrayed? I guess I can understand that.
Still Ubuntu is I feel pretty
Re:Doesn't matter (Score:5, Funny)
OHNOES, an anonymous coward on slashdot is going to "stop using Ubuntu" and "stop recommending it to family, friends, employer, etc." Looks like Ubuntu is done for.
Just when I was starting to believe that 2010 was the year of the Linux desktop, too. :(
well (Score:2)
with me, that made 2 'anonymous' cowards.
probably as of this moment im typing these, it has been 3. and probably will be 4 in the coming minutes. in the end, it will end up in a lot of people.
excuse me, but we use free software for freedom. if ubuntu intervenes in our freedom, in order to make profit, for whatsoever reason, it means they left the freedom philosophy. ill find another, more free linux distribution.
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Funny.
Novell makes a cross-licensing deal with Microsoft, one that doesn't affect their users in any way, shape or form and gives benefits to both companies, then everybody and their dog says they won't touch OpenSuse with a 5-meter pole anymore and that only Microsoft shills will ever see a Suse desktop anymore.
Canonical makes an advertising deal with Yahoo/Microsoft, making ALL their users use a Microsoft product by default, and possibly giving more benefit to Microsoft/Yahoo (in marketshare) than to Cano
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It will affect new isnstallations only. Existing profiles won't be updated. So, no unwanted changes unless you're doing a clean install (admins rarely do).
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Existing profiles that were using the default (Google) will, by policy, remain using the default (now Yahoo) [ubuntu.com]. Ubuntu's policy has always been that: if you changed something we won't touch it, if you are on the default config then the new default will apply.
I'm not sure what would be done if someone explicitly selected Google, though.
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Think of it as job security.
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I think step three in your plan is something along the lines of "users get fed up with the irrelevant searchh results yahoo seems to be giving them, and switch back to using google."
And really, if this was somehow a good idea, why would they only do it to Ubuntu? Why not hit other alternative operating system users as well? This will really only work if Yahoo steals the user's underpants as well.
icrosoft will be paying people for using Ubuntu. (Score:2)
Wow!! Amazing.. just the very thought! Long may it continue...
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Great gauge (Score:5, Interesting)
Delicious! (Score:2, Interesting)
Question (Score:2, Insightful)
Does this affect the Ubuntu - Firefox deal? Debian's version of Firefox is named Iceweasel because Debian legal felt that the Firefox branding was too encumbered to users wishing to redistribute, but Ubuntu reached some sort of compromise that allowed them to keep the Firefox branding.
Will screwing with Firefox's default search affect Ubuntu's relationship with Firefox? I'm expecting "no" but wondering if anyone is able to explain why.
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Re:Question (Score:4, Informative)
Microsoft is no more or less open source than Google.
Chrome has a substantial Free version without the patented parts. IE doesn't.
Re:Question (Score:4, Insightful)
I doubt it. Firefox has always given users the ability to change the default search engine. While Google was paying Mozilla to make Google the default search on those products, it doesn't necessarily affect other deals made.
This is interesting, but I don't think it's all that big a problem. Although it's fun to get all paranoid about Microsoft - with some justification - I don't see this as an attempt to "take over" Ubuntu.
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Firefox has a revenue sharing deal with Google. However, I don't know if the searches generated by an Ubuntu Firefox were part of this deal, since Ubuntu ALSO has one (which is now being replaced) and a Google search from the Ubuntu Firefox contains an URL parameter "rls=com.ubuntu:en-US:official." If Mozilla didn't get any money from Ubuntu searches in the first place, I don't see why this would affect anything.
I think the Debian/Iceweasel thing was a Debian issue rather than a Mozilla issue; they could ha
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I think the Debian/Iceweasel thing was a Debian issue rather than a Mozilla issue; they could have had the Firefox name,
My understanding is they could but only if they
1: took the firefox branding (which was an issue due to the fact it's not available under a free license)
2: gave mozilla veto power on patches (including security updates)
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Re:Question (Score:4, Interesting)
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Almost right, but also that Debian themselves could not update a Firefox-branded browser without getting permission from Mozilla first. I think particularly the security team had a problem with that.
Re:Question (Score:5, Funny)
Not quite. It was actually more like this:
You know, just so we're clear.
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Did you actually read the mailing list threads in question?
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Then again, it may have gone something like this:
Re:Question (Score:5, Informative)
Funny, but for anyone who wants to really understand the issue, it's much more nuanced and more sensible than that.
Mozilla told Debian that Debian could not distributed modified versions of Firefox with the Mozilla trademarked names and images. Debian developers habitually patch upstream software in various ways to make it fit into the Debian system better, to fix bugs, etc. One solution would have been for Debian to ship only the exact versions released by Mozilla. Another solution would have been for Debian to get Mozilla to approve each modified version that Debian wanted to release. A pain, but doable.
However, the discussion highlighted another, deeper problem: If Debian can't modify FF and redistribute the result without infringing on Mozilla's trademarks, that means neither can anyone else. Under Debian's Free Software guidelines, it must be possible for users of Debian to modify and redistribute software at will, [i]without[/i] needing to acquire any additional permissions, or else the software is non-free. That meant that FF is non-free software.
That's not a huge problem; Debian distributes lots of non-free software. So a solution to the problem might have been to get Mozilla's permission to distribute the modifications, and then put FF in the non-free repository. Per the Debian Social Contract, however, non-free software cannot be essential to the operation of the system. So FF couldn't be the default browser on the system.
But Debian [i]wanted[/i] FF to be the default browser, and so did Mozilla. It's a fine browser, perhaps even the best around, free, non-free or proprietary. And Debian really didn't have another good option -- Seamonkey is in the same boat, Dillo sucked, Konqueror is tied to KDE, etc.
Debian's other option, obviously, was to simply ignore their own rules, and ship non-free software as a core system component. That would have been a huge compromise to their principles, and would have opened up all sorts of questions about why *other* non-free software couldn't be in the base system as well. Big can of worms there.
So, what Debian did was to recognize that it was only the trademarked names and artwork which were non-free. The code was under the MPL, which is a Free Software license. Their best option, then, was to distributed the code without the trademarks. Iceweasel, Icedove, etc. are Free Software, per Debian's guidelines, but they have all the functionality of the Mozilla products, and are fully compatible with them.
It wasn't a perfect solution, but it was the best available.
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otoh they keep up with the versions - it seems they fork every version again or so - i don't know...
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Debian has had realtively large patchsets for mozilla software for a long time for various reasons. The branding changes are just one more relatively trivial change to forward port (and don't forget that there would have been branding changes before since the combination of firefox name and free icons wasn't supported by the standard build process).
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Well Debian goal is to be Pure GNU at all costs even if it effects the end user. That is why they made the Iceweasel name. As they feel because the trademark firefox name makes it unpure.
Ubutnu is a bit lax on this and its goal is to be more focused on its users, and less on being Pure... Hence it allows you to install off of apt the "Non-Free" code, after giving a scary lecture to make people who say yes feel like evil criminals. But in terms of Firefox they are ok with using the trademark. Changing the
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Well Debian goal is to be Pure GNU at all costs even if it effects the end user. That is why they made the Iceweasel name. As they feel because the trademark firefox name makes it unpure.
More precisely, Debian's goal is that their core system, including the desktop and the default applications, should be Free Software (which is not the same as GNU software).
Mozilla's enforcement of trademarks on the Firefox name and artwork make the software non-free, in the sense that it is not legal for anyone to modify and redistribute the software at will. Anyone who wants to distribute unmodified copies of FF may do so. Anyone who wants to distribute modified versions must get permission from Mozil
Semantics (Score:3, Funny)
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Or alternately, "selling access to our user base to a corporation". I can guarantee you that's how Yahoo management is thinking about it.
Frankly, this was not what I signed up for when I used Ubuntu to create a largely MS-free environment at home. If need be, I'll roll my own desktop Linux to keep out of this sort of thing. I'm happy to donate time and cash to worthwhile projects, but not if they're going to turn around and get corporate sponsorship.
Re:Semantics (Score:5, Insightful)
Or you could make *two clicks* and change it back. This is a significant opportunity for Canonical to become profitable and could potentially see a minor, insignificant revenue increase for MS. If they were dealing directly with MS you could argue they're asking to be screwed, but with Bing/Windows on the one side and Google/Chrome OS/Android on the other Yahoo appears to be the least self-sabotaging search engine at the moment. Particularly with Chrome OS, Google is looking to make the desktop ecosystem on which Canonical depends an irrelevant commodity in the face of a closed, in-the-cloud system.
If you'd rather use Google then take the two clicks to change it, but don't act as if you're making an ethical stance against corporatism. Google's end goal is you being locked into their webapps, just as MS' end goal is you being locked into their OS and apps.
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Ubuntu has no lock-ins. It provides an easy-to-use system at the cost of compromising certain principles. Everyone place his one's bar where he sees fit
Its not about changing it back. its about support. (Score:2)
millions of users wont change it back. some wont even know they can change it back.
some people who see that guy use ubuntu in his house and get inspired will start using ubuntu, and wont change back.
its about supporting philosophy. we are supporting free software, for freedom. software that becomes less free by getting entangled with determinedly anti freedom stance corporations are bad for us to support for future. it may be just the mono and yahoo/bing search change now, but it is just for now. if this is
Embrace, Extend ... Extinguish (Score:3, Informative)
If someone thinks that Microsoft has changed their stripes, they are being foolish.
In 1996, John Markoff said, "Rather than merely embrace and extend the Internet, the company's critics now fear, Microsoft intends to engulf it." Bing and putting Bing everywhere, including a major Linux distro is just a continuation of that strategy.
In other words, this is just more of the same for a company trying to leverage the Internet and in their most grandiose scheme, somehow come to dominate it.
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open source funded by closed source (Score:3, Insightful)
Products don't magically sell themselves and make their creators wealthy or even put bread on the table - the lesson of open source.
But if the ultimate goal of the open source movement is to eventually overtake closed source software, this is damning evidence such a scenario will never happen. At the end of the day, closed source is funding much of the open source initiatives. One could say this also includes those of us working closed source jobs by day and open source projects by night.
What a dilemma... (Score:2)
Given the way they would have to track this, I suspect Ubuntu only gets money when you actually USE it.
If you switch the search back to Google, Ubuntu won't get paid.
If you don't, you have to actually use Bing.
What a dilemma.
It was nice while it lasted (Score:2, Insightful)
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I've used Ubuntu for a few years now and always though it was great. Using a clearly inferior search engine as a default is pretty bogus. I guess I'll just go back to using Debian. Can't say I blame them though they need to make money somewhere.
So if I have this straight you think Ubuntu is great and now you're going to Debian because you're too lazy to switch the default search engine? Your nerd-fu is weak.
In Soviet Yahoo ... (Score:2, Funny)
... Ubuntu's default browser is Lynx!
Microsoft will be paying people for using Ubuntu? (Score:4, Funny)
Dear Friends; Please do not take this for a junk letter. Bill Gates sharing his fortune. If you ignore this, You will repent later. Microsoft and Google are now the largest Internet companies and in an effort to make sure that Bing remains the most widely used internet search engine, Microsoft and Ubuntu are running an e-mail beta test.
When you forward this e-mail to friends, Microsoft can and will track it (If you are a Ubuntu user) For a two weeks time period.
For every person that you forward this e-mail to, Microsoft will pay you $245.00 For every person that you sent it to that forwards it on, Microsoft will pay you $243.00 and for every third person that receives it, You will be paid $241.00. Within two weeks, Microsoft will contact you for your address and then send you a check.
I thought this was a scam myself, But two weeks after receiving this e-mail and forwarding it on. Microsoft contacted me for my address and withindays, I receive a check for $24,800.00. You need to respond before the beta testing is over. If anyone can affoard this, Bill gates is the man.
It's all marketing expense to him. Please forward this to as many people as possible. You are bound to get at least $10,000.00. We're not going to help them out with their e-mail beta test without getting a little something for our time. My brother's girlfriend got in on this a few months ago. When i went to visit him for the Baylor/UT game. She showed me her check. It was for the sum of $4,324.44 and was stamped "Paid in full"
...
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A couple months later.... (Score:2)
I have asked the desktop team to start preparing
these changes to make them available in Lucid as soon as reasonably
possible. Probably on the order of weeks.
Change #1 In Lucid, the desktop background will now feature Google AdSense.
This will aid users in finding sites closely related to the personal information harvested from their home directory.
Change #2
Change #1 will be unoptional.
Why?
I am pursuing this ch
use ixquick.com instead - way better privacy (Score:4, Informative)
I've switched to using
It's a meta search engine that focusses on privacy by not logging your IP address and your searches. On the technical side, it's nearly as good as the big name search engine I used previously.
Here's a plugin for GNU IceCat / IceWeasel / Firefox: Ixquick [mozilla.org], or the https version [mozilla.org] (which I haven't tried, but I guess is the same to users).
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Thank Goodness For (Score:2, Interesting)
Canonical? (Score:2)
Awesome, Ubuntu is such a community player. (Score:3)
Yep, they sure are, making money off of someone elses work ... thats the true spirit of OSS.
Fortunately for Ubuntu, its entirely acceptable from Mozilla's standpoint, but it certainly qualifies them as fucking douche bags.
Re:Even More Money (Score:5, Insightful)
And if one uses Bing Cashback, one is being paid by Microsoft to use Ubuntu and giving them money to shop online using it, perhaps to buy a Linux-friendly netbook and the cycle continues.
Actually, in neither case is Microsoft actually paying anything.
With Bing Cashback, what users are paid are covered by affiliate commissions send to Microsoft from the participating sites.
With paying Ubuntu, Yahoo/Microsoft is actually paying Ubuntu a share from ad clicks.
In both cases Microsoft isn't losing anything. Actually, they're generating more revenue.
Re:Even More Money (Score:5, Insightful)
In both cases Microsoft isn't losing anything. Actually, they're generating more revenue.
My company pays me to do a job. That job, hopefully, earns my company money. Generally more money than they're paying me.
So, they're generating more revenue... But they're still paying me.
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Thanks for bursting my bubble! I was enjoying the delicious irony, and you go and tell me there is no irony, that MS is just being MS?
Darn you, reality! Now I'm miffed that once again, MS is using means other than having a better product to gain marketshare. I guess when your product is inferior you have to resort to being underhanded.
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They removed GIMP? I'm not surprised, GIMP is overkill for what most people need or can understand. Give an older person Photoshop on Windows and they'll get confused, they need something more basic.
Yahoo search financial decision aside, Ubuntu doesn't want to make it as hard to configure to use as Windows, they want to make it as easy to use for the average joe (not us) to use. The Windows 7 adverts are nailing how easy it is to use and how "I suggested this and they did it!" which is probably what Ub
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removing gimp isn't a good reason to put mono on ubuntu.
add this revenue sharing (aka yahoo default) and add me to the list of users who isn't using ubuntu anymore. This is dipping their toes way too much into a gray area here.
any other suggestions of equally good linux flavors that don't have mono or the firefox move here?
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Re:Worse (Score:4, Informative)
Yes...
They whined about how much space GIMP was taking up only to replace it with something that takes nearly the same amount of space if you include mono dependencies.
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umm, fspot uses mono. Mono is equivalent to having .net dependencies on linux, which creates patent issues and other concerns. Does anyone want that in linux? No.
Re:Worse (Score:4, Funny)
Have you considered Gubuntu? It's a flavor of Ubuntu that aims at the more Google oriented crowd by changing the default search engine to Google.
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any other suggestions of equally good linux flavors that don't have mono or the firefox move here?
Can't answer the "equally good flavor" for you but, try Gentoo Linux. Just add "-mono" to your global USE flags and you won't be bothered.
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Up next, I really wish Mandrivia was the big boy instead of Ubuntu, it had some really cool and innovative features that made the user experience sweet before Ubuntu even had naked pictures.
It will be interesting to note whether Mint will go with the Ubuntu changes or spin off and avoid them.
Looks like a growing part of Ubuntu's revenue source is "paid" changes/defaults.
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debian?
But it's very 'raw' I feel, at least, I dabble in using Squeeze (Debian Testing), and there are plenty of bugs that are fixed in Ubuntu
While I'm sure there have been releases where Ubuntu was less buggy than the nearest Debian release, this simply isn't true in general; sometimes Ubuntu releases are better, sometimes they're worse. What Ubuntu does have, though, is more end-user-oriented support, a willingness to throw in some proprietary apps, and great marketing...
Other than those things, though, the Debian and Ubuntu are extremely similar to each other in feel, feature-set, and general robustness (they're far, far, closer to each ot
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They removed GIMP? I'm not surprised, GIMP is overkill for what most people need or can understand. Give an older person Photoshop on Windows and they'll get confused, they need something more basic.
No, thiy didn't remove GIMP. The removed GIMP from the default install. It was there in the first place as a sort of show-case of what was available but, being a fairly specialised application, it is now a bit of an anachronism in a basic install.
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I'll have to go back to a default Ubuntu install I did on another disk, but I can tell you that Easy Peasy (based on Ubuntu NBR) does this and replaces it with... wait for it... Picasa.
That was the first thing to get removed and replaced with Gimp. Gimp really is much lighter on resources than Picasa.
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Well, that's true and all but that's not the point. Picasa is a more appropriate tool for
the average n00b that wants to futz with a few (or a lot) of photos. It has a good interface
for processing multiple images, a well laid out interface, a reasonably good red-eye tool
and it doesn't try to force a complete separation from the filesystem.
Picasa is something that a Windows user suddenly subjected to MacOS might install in place of iPhoto.
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I was under the understanding that Gimp is still in the repository, but just not automatically installed.
Evidenced by:
http://packages.ubuntu.com/lucid/graphics/gimp [ubuntu.com]
GIMP on the DVD? (Score:2)
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do they want to make it as hard to configure Ubuntu as to configure Windows?
I'm happy with Mandriva and haven't tried Ubantu, but isn't Ubantu supposed to be the Linux for Windows users?
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Re:Worse (Score:5, Insightful)
Yet despite all of this: the ordained replacement didn't improve upon any of these alleged failings.
Sure... replace it with something better, not something inferior.
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What was it replaced with?
Google stole the name (Score:5, Informative)
"Chrome" has long been the term for the browser's UI...the toolbars, status bars, and such that surround the content.
Google calling its browser "Chrome(tm)" would be like calling an operating system "Windows(tm)."
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A good random example of this:
http://www.w3.org/Style/CSS/Test/CSS1/current/sec5526c.gif [w3.org] (Reference image for the Acid 1 test.)
This test is quite old - HTML 4 and CSS1 - and the window border (which you'll note they refer to as "generic chrome") shows this fairly clearly. It far predates both Firefox and Chrome (browser).
As a side note, when Windows first came out, it wasn't really an OS; it was little more than a window manager and an API. While definitely not the first graphical computer operating environ
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Re:first post (Score:4, Informative)
Still not quite correct, it should be: Microsoft paying other people who manage an open source operating system to switch their end users default search engine.
I don't know about you, but I don't get paid by Microsoft to use Bing/Yahoo. It seems that the people who are getting paid are Canonical, not the users. I'm just glad they're providing options.
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If it meant Canonical got a big fat check, I'd *want* then to install "IE for Linux".
I mean come on, people, does it really take an unusual amount of vision to prefer a sustainable Ubuntu that's 98% perfect on install rather than one that can't sustain itself that is 100% perfect? Especially when we're only talking about defaults which can be easily changed?
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Freedom is somewhat like virginity. 98% free is not free.
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This should be rated 10 not 0 (Score:2)
Nailed it.