Dapper Drake

Ubuntu 6.06 ("Dapper Drake") was released yesterday, and most of the main distribution servers were subsequently rammed. Luckily, I seem to be the only one who tried the Ukrainian server; it was quite fast. I've installed it over Debian, and I'm impressed; very slick. The disc is both a 'Live' CD and an install CD; unfortunately, this means that one must (apparently) wait for the "Live" version of the OS to start before it can be installed to your hard drive. On the plus side, however, this means that the installer is very pretty and the installation process is a piece of cake. Overall, installation was relatively quick and painless. I still had to manually edit xorg.conf to take full advantage of my monitor's available resolutions and refresh rates, but aside from that things were great on the hardware side.

1. The default packages are fantastic (almost everything you could want, and up-to-date), the interface is shiny and clean, and updates are a breeze. I've run into only two issues so far:DVD and MP3 playback aren't available by default, so I grabbed VLC, etc... from the "universe" and "multiverse" binary repositories. While I understand why this is the case, they didn't make any solutions apparent for novice users.
2. After installing the updates, VLC, Flash Player, Java 1.0.5_07, and ATi's proprietary driver, OpenOffice.org stopped working. My guess is that it's related to the Java Runtime Environment I installed, but I'm still looking into it.
   

So far, Ubuntu 6.06 is shaping-up to be one of the cleanest, most lightweight (*ahem*SuSE*cough*), and easiest-to-use versions of Linux yet. The more up-to-date stable packages are a big plus, and the automation of many everyday desktop functions elimiates a lot of the headaches that Linux can bring to the majority of computer users. Unfortunately, it kinda takes a lot of the fun out of the Linux experience for enthusiasts. I just don't feel the same kind of satisfaction here that I do after installing Debian or tweaking Windows to get the best performance out of my hardware. Regardless, this release of Ubuntu is a huge step forward for Linux becoming a viable desktop environment for the casual computer user.

In other news, I went to Best Buy, EB Games, and Wal-Mart (same plaza) to pick-up Half-Life 2: Episode 1 yesterday. Best Buy said it came out on May 30 (but didn't have any copies), EB Games said it wasn't out yet (even though it is), and I tried not to talk to anybody at Wal-Mart ;)