What are the Implications of Kubuntu with Wayland and Ubuntu with Mir

[SteveRiley]

Ah, my earlier post isn't a statement of direction or even a prediction. I was simply expressing what seems like a reasonable strategy. It may yet be too early for the Kubuntu team to begin making plans.

And I'm not intending to go anywhere else for the time being. Thanks for your kind words.

[NoWorries]

Keep up the Good Work through this Difficult Period

A not unreasonable approach would be for Blue Systems to take a larger leadership role. Begin by consolidating the effort: why maintain both Netrunner and Kubuntu? Blue should evaluate the gains that consolidation might bring. Next, Blue should spend some money: bring an accomplished X/Wayland developer on staff. From here, it might be possible to rebase onto Debian, and create a solid, first-class KDE with all the freshness of current packages. Divorcing Kubuntu from Canonical would bring a welcome degree of stability. SA(B)DFL's whims are beginning to tire me.

I thought that something along the lines of this approach would eventuate. In one way I am glad that you detailed what is likely to happen. Unfortunately from your perspective, where you have previously had involvement in Ubuntu Conferences and developed friendships during this time, it will be both difficult and exciting for you to realign yourself with a different community. I hope that all these changes are not too disruptive on you and others in the Kubuntu team. I wish you well as you journey through this change in the coming year(s).

NoWorries

[SteveRiley]

the Kubuntu Team will do the best job they can with Blue Systems to make this a stellar distribution

A not unreasonable approach would be for Blue Systems to take a larger leadership role. Begin by consolidating the effort: why maintain both Netrunner and Kubuntu? Blue should evaluate the gains that consolidation might bring. Next, Blue should spend some money: bring an accomplished X/Wayland developer on staff. From here, it might be possible to rebase onto Debian, and create a solid, first-class KDE with all the freshness of current packages. Divorcing Kubuntu from Canonical would bring a welcome degree of stability. SA(B)DFL's whims are beginning to tire me.

[kubicle]

Kubuntu will be fine in the short term, and quite possibly even in the long term...so there is no cause for panic (the rats are still firmly inside the ship).

Lots can happen in a year, and there are still a multitude of ways how the "MIR thing" can pan out.

Of course it never hurts to keep an eye on other distributions (even when you're fully satisfied with your main one).

[NoWorries]

Thanks Rog131, oshunluvr and others for investigating alternative deb based distributions. You have confirmed my approach to stick with Kubuntu as I strongly believe that the Kubuntu Team will do the best job they can with Blue Systems to make this a stellar distribution. As bsniadajewski says:

Looks like things could get... interesting... in the coming year or two.

I am prepared to hold tight and support this team and hope that SABDFL accommodates the other ubuntu variants and not just his own preferred Unity with Mir which is currently causing dissension.

[oshunluvr]

Not sure I understand this -- do you mean it won't let you set up a (non-/) btrfs filesystem during installation, or do you mean it won't let you install the OS on a btrfs filesystem? If you're thinking of installing the OS on a btrfs filesystem, you need to be aware of this bug which kills booting -- not fun if you're not aware of it.

It will install on btrfs, but doesn't use subpartitioning: I.e. @ for root and @home for home like (K/U)buntu does.

[bsniadajewski]

Looks like things could get... interesting... in the coming year or two.

[dibl]

Sid's install also does not conform to btrfs install preferences.

Not sure I understand this -- do you mean it won't let you set up a (non-/) btrfs filesystem during installation, or do you mean it won't let you install the OS on a btrfs filesystem? If you're thinking of installing the OS on a btrfs filesystem, you need to be aware of this bug which kills booting -- not fun if you're not aware of it.

[oshunluvr]

Sid's install also does not conform to btrfs install preferences. Being browser borne doesn't lend it to easy tinkering. I'll have to consider how to get around that.

I think there are too few good installation programs in the linux world.

[dibl]

Here's my main productivity machine:

don@imerabox:/$ inxi -F
System:    Host: imerabox Kernel: 3.9-6.towo-siduction-amd64 x86_64 (64 bit) 
           Desktop: KDE 4.10.4 Distro: aptosid 2011-02 Ἡμέρα - kde-lite - (201107131633)
Machine:   Mobo: ASUSTeK model: P6X58D-E version: Rev 1.xx Bios: American Megatrends version: 0602 date: 03/24/2011
CPU:       Quad core Intel Core i7 CPU 950 (-HT-MCP-) cache: 8192 KB flags: (lm nx sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 ssse3 vmx) 
           Clock Speeds: 1: 1600.00 MHz 2: 1600.00 MHz 3: 1600.00 MHz 4: 1600.00 MHz 5: 1600.00 MHz 6: 1600.00 MHz 7: 2800.00 MHz 8: 2800.00 MHz
Graphics:  Card: NVIDIA GF100 [GeForce GTX 480] X.Org: 1.12.4 driver: nvidia Resolution: 1920x1200@59.9hz 
           GLX Renderer: GeForce GTX 480/PCIe/SSE2 GLX Version: 4.3.0 NVIDIA 319.23
Audio:     Card-1: NVIDIA GF100 High Definition Audio Controller driver: snd_hda_intel 
           Card-2: Intel 82801JI (ICH10 Family) HD Audio Controller driver: snd_hda_intel 
           Card-3: Logitech QuickCam Communicate STX driver: USB Audio 
           Sound: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture ver: k3.9-6.towo-siduction-amd64
Network:   Card: Marvell 88E8056 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet Controller driver: sky2 
           IF: eth0 state: up speed: 100 Mbps duplex: full mac: 20:cf:30:5c:41:1d
Drives:    HDD Total Size: 2136.5GB (3.8% used) 1: id: /dev/sda model: OCZ size: 60.0GB 
           2: id: /dev/sdc model: KINGSTON_SS100S2 size: 16.0GB 3: id: /dev/sdb model: OCZ size: 60.0GB 
           4: id: /dev/sdd model: WDC_WD1002FAEX size: 1000.2GB 5: id: /dev/sde model: WDC_WD1002FAEX size: 1000.2GB 
Partition: ID: / size: 19G used: 14G (78%) fs: ext4 ID: /boot size: 495M used: 273M (58%) fs: ext2 
           ID: swap-1 size: 15.48GB used: 0.00GB (0%) fs: swap 
Sensors:   System Temperatures: cpu: 43.0C mobo: 35.0C gpu: 49C 
           Fan Speeds (in rpm): cpu: 1962 psu: 0 sys-1: 0 sys-2: 0 sys-3: 0 
Info:      Processes: 307 Uptime: 1 day Memory: 1495.1/5966.3MB Client: Shell (bash) inxi: 1.9.8 
don@imerabox:/$

As you see, it started life in 2011 as aptosid "Imera" and still has the hostname I originally gave it. In early 2012 I "cross-graded" it to siduction, which of course only involved the distro repos, not the Debian Sid repos. The siduction installer is a nice piece of work, but rather different from the ubiquity installer that *buntu uses, so be prepared for a couple of false starts until you get the hang of it.

Although the siduction dev team are mostly native German speakers, they all can put together a good English sentence to answer a question. They do like their IRC channel for fast support, but the time difference with the USA causes me to stick with the forum for the most part. Also, there are quite a large group of siduction users in Brazil who have a Portuguese forum.

BTW, I would be very cautious about using siduction for a "serious" (i.e. commercial or mission-critical) server, due to the lack of extensive testing of incoming sid packages. I find it a fun and educational desktop experience, and I've got two laptops and a netbook that also run great with siduction, but if I were a professional sysadmin I would not want the drama that sometimes comes up with sid.

[oshunluvr]

I'm trying out Siduction 13.1 and ZevonOS Neptune 3.1.

So far, Neptune's installer script does an "improper" install to btrfs. Improper as in not using subvolumes as install targets. I tricked it into doing what I wanted through - not a very secure installer.

Comparing Siduction with Aptosid - Siduction seems a bit more ahead of Aptosid in terms of package versions, which I like. Plus, general 'net consensus (is that an oxymoron?) is the Aptosid group are unpleasant to deal with on the forum. I have a hard enough time around here biting my tongue! We';; see how the install goes.

[Rog131]

If the brown stuff hits the spinny thing...

There is the 'mother' Debian.

Wheezy ~ Precise





and the more 'experimental' : aptosid (http://www.aptosid.com/) or starting Tanglu (http://tanglu.org/).

[kubicle]

Hate to burst your bubble, but...
https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/mir-bzr/

...lovely imagery

Still, let's talk about that when I see it working...it doesn't take much to put things in AUR, getting things to run smoothly and work with the rest of the system is another matter completely.

[SteveRiley]

Mir may change that. If unity will only run on MIr, it would be a bigger task to port it to other distros (and probably not worth the effort)

Hate to burst your bubble, but...

https://aur.archlinux.org/packages/mir-bzr/

[NoWorries]

It's obvious that Canonical has lost interest in keeping Ubuntu as a Linux distribution, and instead wants to build a kind of semi-proprietary operating system. The dilemma for the flavors, then is to decide whether to remain a distribution, and undergo necessary realignments, or whether to stick with Canonical. The former is more difficult, the latter seems dangerous.

Thanks very much to all who have provided the updates on this issue - LOL and some sadness. It is very much appreciated by me.

I feel that it is best to be forewarned so that you can be forearmed. The outcome with Canonical will determine if we keep the "B" in SABDFL when referring to Mark Shuttleworth. We can only hope that the "Benevolent" part comes to the fore in this process. At least he seems aware of the hornets nest that has been stirred up with what is being proposed.

Since many are providing a graphic to illustrate their position, I will add one which I hope prevails with SABDFL from Down Under.