Contributor Crandom

Currently it is very difficult to setup and control access to shared folders without editing conf files and reading detailed instructions on all the variables. I propose that sharing (specifically Samba) be given a well worked GUI and some real TLC to bring it up to standard with the experience on Windows or OS X.

For example, by default a share should be accessible as Read Only by anyone on the network without a username or password (guest access). While guest access should be turned on by default, it should also be easy to turn it off, and if desired to give guests read/write access to the folder.

You should also be able to specify local users who will have read/write access, and these local users should sync with smb users invisibly (ie: the user doesn't need to know that there are two password databases being used).

I propose the Properties window for a folder should contain a Sharing tab with all the options available to choose. I also propose a Shared Folders option in the Preferences menu should list the currently shared folders along with their settings, and provide a button to take you into the dialogue where you can set the options.

I think it would be useful if nautilus could show preview of gimp's xcf files in thumbnails like it does with jpeg and png files

Dell seems to be ignoring this in Ideastorm.
http://www.ideastorm.com/article/show/62549/coreboot_formerly_LinuxBIOS_instead _of_proprietary_BIOS

Maybe Canonical could bring it up at their next meeting or something.

Benefits:
# 100% Free Software (GPL), no royalties, no license fees!
# Fast boot times (3 seconds from power-on to Linux console)
# Runs in 32-Bit protected mode almost from the start

Coreboot link:
http://www.coreboot.org/Welcome_to_coreboot

Network shares are becoming increasingly common for home users, and many laptop users routinely connect and disconnect to networks with shares.

Ubuntu should have an option to automatically mount designated shares when they are detected, and unmount them when they disappear. At present the system requires a sudo mount -a to go and check the /etc/fstab and mount any strays.

Users have already posted a script that does this in the forums.

http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu
The "Get Ubuntu" page should have a link to purchase Ubuntu pre-installed on machines. It should list System76 and Dell as international providers, and then provide a localized list below that. This will encourage computer buyers to purchase computers with Ubuntu pre-installed and help those already looking for this.

At least link to the wiki page:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuPre-installed

Also:
http://webapps.ubuntu.com/partners/system/

Just right-click on the media, and click on "Rename Disk".

Originally, i was really against the idea of a dark theme, and maybe i'd still prefer it if Ubuntu would lighten up a little. I understand the organic theme completely, but please...this is an operating system. Anyways, all the dark themes i had seen really turned me off and even the best ones seemed to be loved by some and hated by others. If we're going to have a dark theme, lets have one that we can all agree on. When i saw the Intrepid alpha screenshot, like many others, i gagged a little.

How people interact with their computer is really essential to their satisfaction. This is why aside from features, the software's stability (minimizing annoying bugs), speed (clean code and making everything as efficient and responsive as possible), and interface (look and feel) are the three most important things that should be our focus and be kept at a high priority.
We should really work to increase usability: http://mpt.net.nz/archive/2008/08/01/free-software-usability

I have looked through all the artwork submissions for Intrepid, and of all of them, this is the one dark theme that i would actually like to use: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Artwork/Incoming/Intrepid/Wall-light

I first saw it on this Digg submission: http://digg.com/linux_unix/Intrepid_Ibex_Mockup_Designs

Of course, i'm sure everyone will have input to make it even better. This isn't a final design, but vote for the concept so far!

P.S. Please Digg :) Thanks http://digg.com/linux_unix/Vote_for_a_beautiful_usable_Ubuntu

This is not my idea.

You can get a lot of tutorials explaining how to do it.
But they are very scary for a newbie.


It would be really nice if there were a GUI tool for linux and windows(of course! ;D) to which i could point the .iso file,and it would ask me to boot from the disk on next reboot.
Or better than that, it should have an option to copy all the settings from my current installation and automatically set it up in the new installation.

A new version of Ubuntu is released every 6 months.
Unlike windows Ubuntu is so stable that i never had to reinstall it.No doubt getting an new Ubuntu CD is damn easy.But Since i am in the habit of upgrading to every new version, i have dozens of CDs lying at the bottom of my drawer. What a waste!

I have made my own customized 'Hacked Heron' which fits only on a dvd. I am unable to install it on my friend's computer who does not have a dvd drive and another whose dvd drive is broken.

When a USB stick (or some other kind of data storage) is pulled out, while something is written on it or while part of the data is still cached in the RAM, freeze all file operations to the device and demand it to be plugged in again. After it is plugged in again, complete the remaining operations and unmount the device.
If the warning dialogue is canceled by the user, then cancel all operations and regard the device as unmounted.

edit: Thanks to Auzy for finding the very good description of this in http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/idea/1515/ which was lost due to being incorrectly marked as a duplicate of something completely different.

People around the globe that are using/concidering using Ubuntu are afraid that some of their hardware won't work for them. And some are frustrated to buy additional add-on cards to work around unsupportad onboard chips. All this could be avoided with a lookup in an ubuntu Hardware Database Website.

Some problematic hardware can be used with more or less work if helping information is available together with the hardware compatabillity data.

The hardware database can be found at http://hwdb.ubuntu.com/

From idea #47: The data should then be available in a format that is simple for users to browse on-line when considering new hardware.

every time i login i can't see the ntfs drives mounted.I must go to computer the click on each one to mount it( i have ubuntu 8.04) and i did not have this problem in ubuntu 7.10. Maybe for the new (unlock) icon.
I hope to make ubuntu mount them automatically after the logon.
-going to try login with root to see if there any changes-
thank you

When the /home paritition is full, and we try to login, gdm just don't login and go back to the connection screen.

We have not any informations why the login fails. I know by searching into forums that it is because the partition was full and I just had to remove some files.

This kind of problems is frequent, and a newbie cannot do anything, he must search on google, but without a working session, he cannot do anything.

For me it is a blocking issue.

I propose to show a warning message which explains why we cannot login (partition full, not write access, etc), if we cannot do that at login, do it when the partition has less than 5% space available or something like that.

I find it very annoying when I update my Ubuntu box, only to find that after the update I need to reboot. I suggest a solution similar to Apple's software update*, where the update has the reboot icon located next to it to signify that a reboot will be needed or a reboot icon on the panel, similar to the way the new red down arrow in hardy signifies an important update.

*Image for reference: http://i92.photobucket.com/albums/l25/CATSCEO/update.png

Hardware acceleration of visual components helps to free resources, by utilizing the processing power of the Gpu.

Currently, the (afaik) the only hardware accelerated component of the Ubuntu distribution is the windowing system.

Please work toward hw accelerating the rest of the visual stack.

There needs to be an easy way to recover a Ubuntu installation that got screwed somehow. [Edit: In my case, I uninstalled GNOME and switched to KDE, but then was not able to use my network, so I couldn't reinstall GNOME.] My idea is an option on the Live CD (called "Recover my Ubuntu") that will re-install all the packages that came with Ubuntu, leaving all your files and preferences untouched. This option would also allow for a CD-assisted startup of Ubuntu.

I don't really know if this has already been implemented on Ubuntu, but applying Fedora ideas to boost X startup would be appreciated.

http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/OneSecondX

After all, it takes up a lot of space, creates clutter and it's absolutely of no use for people that got just one user on the computer.

Many new users are confused by device names such as /dev/sda1, /dev/sdb5, /dev/hda2, /dev/hdc4, etc.

So I propose to show volume labels (partition names) in the installer, to make it easier for users who install Ubuntu to know which partition they are installing on.

Screenshots:
* Before
* After

This will make it clearer and easier to install Ubuntu without any mistakes being done which might result in that a new user accidentally looses valuable data.

There is a logic for this in my opinion:

1 - Improve usability, stability and speed for Firefox users in Ubuntu. Beta 5 has some big issues.

2 - This also would help the Mozilla dev team because there would be thousand of users using RC1 instead of Beta5.

3 - The "Beta" can confuse some users.


So, what do you think?

When Firefox 3 is released, make sure it is available to Ubuntu on the same day, so the updates from the Ubuntu repository can be counted for the *Guinness world record* in most downloads in 24 hours.
And most importantly, talk to Mozilla about relaying your Firefox 3 repository download data to them.
More info here: http://www.spreadfirefox.com/en-US/worldrecord

Let's help open source achieve another great victory!

RE to developer: You would have counted downloads, not users...