Ubuntu 12.04 Beta: Nice Looking Desktop

Yesterday I had to install Windows 7 for my work...really straightforward process. You know how it goes add a username and password, decide if you are on a network, add some security patches and restart....add some more security patches and restart...add even more security patches you couldn't add before and restart...and then...oh yea.. add the last 40 security patches and restart and now you have a running system. All you have to add is a program to kill viruses, set up your firewall, add a word processing option, add a new browser and yes restart.

Today, some Windows guy whined that they couldn't run the word processing program they have for Windows because they “lost” the menu and all they have is icons...so I told him, all you have to do is restart. Of course it was a lie, but I was gone before the restart completed.

So I thought, what about icons...why are icons so hard...I mean don't you have a cell phone....I don't can't get them to work where I live. But hey, I like icons it make a desktop clean. In fact another person complained to me that the new Ubuntu was all icons...why not try it out. Download a iso and here we go.

Put in the disk choose “Install Ubuntu”... not too difficult.

First time around I was a little cheap on disk space...you can see it would not let me go forward as I found I needed at least 4.4 GB.

So, I got the disk space right and downloaded the updates as I installed..guess what I did not do 5 restarts. You can also add 3rd party software at this point if you want...easy.

Next, wipe out stuff...it will be gone for good. Who cares...this is why I have the test box.

The disk is erased.

Add my location.

Add a user and now a great feature I like, log in automatically. I don't have to go and change that later. You also see home folder encryption is also available.

So here comes the terrible icons.

You know actually, I like it. The desktop is clean, powerful and looks great. The icons are easy to get to and easy to use. Remember the old GOS Linux desktop, it is very similar. Most people hardly use more than four or five programs anyway.

I like the vivid colors and the work that has gone into setting up the desktop. I work 10-12 hours a day at the command line so seeing some color once in a while is really nice. I think the icon set that is used is outstanding, I like anyway.

To me it looks like a good start, now I need to dig in under the hood to see what is there.

Oh ...yep I did have to do one restart.