Contributor LostOverThere

For those of us foolish enough to own MP3 players that can only be accessed in MTP mode (e.g. Creative players) it'd be great if Ubuntu would treat them as removable drives (like it does with players in MSC mode).

Right now I can easily add and remove music using Amarok and the great libmtp but I have no easy way to browse the files on the device. And this means no easy way to add video and photos.

I understand not everyone needs MTP support so maybe this could be an optional extra (a plug-in?) for Nautilus.

Instead of setting up different users to change the way your desktop works for you (layout/window manager/etc) have the ability to setup presets.

For Example:

When using blender if you use compiz, it advisable to turn it off beforehand and use metacity, in which case, you'll probably want to close cairo dock. By doing so you'll probably want another panel in gnome at the bottom screen to manage windows.

Instead of doing this everytime it would be great to just select the Blender Desktop Preset (created by yourself) and the desktop suddenly changes to exactly how you want it laid out.

It would be real handy to be able to see the radar show the last 5 or more images, so that it is easier to see where the clouds / storms are heading.

When is still so hard to find on sale hardware with Ubuntu OEM (specially in Europe), would be awesome shop.canonical.com selling hardware (desktop, notebooks and netbooks) with Ubuntu OEM - this would help to increase the popularity of the Ubuntu OEM, and provide an interesting chain reaction on all hardware manufacturers, i hope.

Everex also put on sale recently a desktop computer cheaper than a Windows Vista licence, which i considered a very interesting marketing idea (it seems to had a strong success on places like WalMart, for example). The site shop.canonical.com could bet on this as well.

When I boot up, the gnome menu should load up by default. I have to wait 2-3 seconds after clicking the menu icon for it to load. This load should have already been done, as the first thing many people do once booting up is to run a program via the menu. It is the little polishes like this that make Ubuntu such a great operating system.

(Note: This affects the Gnome Menu applet. I'm not sure if it affects the Menu Bar applet.)

Continue pushing for the implementation of CNR (from Linspire).

I think a access to CNR would greatly add to the usability of Ubuntu.

I know Ubuntu has/is looked at this, I would just like to give it a push.

I believe that the visual feedback of selected icons on the desktop needs to be revamped. I like the "light up" effect on mouse over, but when you select an icon, it turns to the "selected items" color that you set in your theme, which can be dark, making the icon hard to read and see. I like a selection that boxes the icon, and i think it would look better.

This idea is pretty simple, have three different options to pick your default experience:

1. For Streamlined or Low RAM experience (Visual Effects OFF)
2. Optimized amount of Visual Effects
3. Aesthetically pleasing (All Visual Effects On)

Options 2 and 3 would automatically set up Visual Effects (test to see if system can handle first; perhaps in-installation visual test) and install at the minimum Simple CompizConfig Settings Manager.

It is not enough that Ubuntu has the nicest tent in the entire linux village, if at the end of the day most computer user's won't even bother to make the trip out to the village.

Before humans broke the sound barrier in flight, the US Airforce created their "X project", which built some of the first prototype jet aircraft that would eventually reach this goal. Linux needs an "X-project".

If Mark Shuttleworth is really keen on surpassing Apple in the 'good looks' department, he'll have to do more than just talk the talk.

"Linux for humans" is a laudable goal, but ultimately a failed one. Hear me out: Most humans aren't interested in 'linux'. What people want is "You, happier" - the new Best Buy slogan. They want a rich internet and media experience. They want 'walk out with it working'. Anything that stands in the way, distracts, or makes them have to deal with side issues will not suffice.

Linux (as it now exists) tries to make people care about kernels and partitions and a host of other issues that are of great importance to the machine, but are of little or no interest to the user of that machine.

99% of linux systems are essentially the same (when working properly) to the end user. The end result is a familiar, uninspired attempt to ape an already 'tried and true' computing experience. Worse, as much as Ubuntu tries to hide the plumbing from the user, it always shows. It's like trying to put a dress on a chimpanzee. She might be pretty, but she'll never be girlfriend material.

What Ubuntu (and linux) needs is a fresh approach to what a linux system can be, based on the principles of appeal and usability. Look at Aza Raskin's work at Mozilla Labs for starters. Like Disney, Ubuntu needs 'imagineers' - people with the power to dream, and the knowhow to make it happen.

I think that would be awesome that if there was a Key combination to change the window or minimize it, like in Windows the Alt + Tab or the super key.
Sorry for the English.
Thanks

A profile management tool in NetworkManager is essential to laptop or portable device. It is best to network "configured once" and "used all time".

NetworkManager would "forget" my wireless setting whenever it can't connect to the same SSID. I have to type WEP keys all the time. And I think that is crazy.



In my history of Linux / GNOME, I tried many ways to configure network:


command line
============
It is sure that ifconfig, route, iptables are powerful. But they takes time to learn. And they are not friendly to roaming devices (like laptop).


network applet
==============
The original GNOME network management applet can save network settings as "profile". I can switch between network by specify different profile. But it doesn't handle wireless network well. Switching between networks is easier, but still painful.


network manager
===============
NetworkManger is great! I think it is better than the network configuration tools in both Windows and Mac! Wireless networks are very visible to me. And configuration is easy!

The problem starts when I start roaming with my laptop. I used 2 wireless network with the same SSID. One of them is WEP and the other is open network. Each time I move between these 2 place, I have to configure my network again.

[....]

Everyone by now has seen the world famous mockups of what Ubuntu apparently should look like. The problem is that what is shown in those mockups is not yet possible with the current way gnome works.

I worry with everyone clambering for this mythical theme and with time running out before 8.10 ships, what will end up happening is Ubuntu will ship with the same old problematic brown and orange theme that is so hated by a lot of people.

There is a solution though...

The Dust theme
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Artwork/Incoming/Intrepid/DustTheme

The Dust theme has gotten a lot of praises on Digg and is easily as sexy as anything I've personally seen for Linux (and I'm not usually a fan of dark themes), bust most promising of all... is actually possible with the current technology we have at our disposal.

It's time to be bold! Stop defaulting to the same brown and orange and make a big bold change. Embrace Dust.

Yes you will get a few idiots who will say it's too like Vista just because it's black, but ignore them people. The wider tech community will praise Ubuntu for finally ditching its dorky themes and becoming sophisticated and sexy. New users will be eager to try out this Ubuntu thing they have heard so much about.

This is a major change, and I know it will be controversial. Please read the whole thing before voting, and leave a comment about why you voted the way you did.

There are two places where Ubuntu is used: at home, and by companies. Both want different things from an Operating System.

Companies want a rock-solid OS that is updated in a steady cycle every few years. They are already well-served by the LTS releases.

Home users want cutting-edge applications on a stable core. The absolute latest released versions of OpenOffice, Firefox, etc. on top of an X.org, kernel, etc. that is rock-solid. They are not currently well-served.

Part of the problem is that the applications are updated only every six months with each new release, meaning that certain apps can be several versions out-of-date before they get updated. The other part of the problem is that each release (excepting LTS) has a cutting-edge core, which hasn't had all the bugs worked out (remember compiz in Gutsy). My proposed solution is as follows:

Divide all supported Ubuntu packages into two sections: 'core' and 'apps'. Packages in 'core' will follow the current release cycle, but with a higher emphasis on stability even for non-LTS releases. Packages in 'apps' on the other hand will use a rolling release cycle with a temporary freeze before each release, and a branch freeze before each LTS.

LTS users won't notice any change, but home users will hopefully notice the following:
- the core system (x.org, kernel, gnome) is more stable
- the apps (Firefox, OpenOffice) are kept properly up-to-date

Note: I know backports addresses some of this issue, but not all of it. It specifically doesn't address the instability of the core system during non-LTS releases.

So, let's say whenever a new version's cycle begins canonical makes a theme contest with some prizes. Of course, the entries must pass to some screening based on published guidelines, I'd guess canonical would be interested in enforcing ubuntu looks and some color spectrum for the team.

Then we have a public vote among ubuntu users to select the new theme, let's say when three months remain for the release, so there can be polishing done to the theme.

PNGs are horrible for icons because you can never predict how big the user will set their icons as, or how big certain programs will need them. Therefore we should replace all the PNG icons with SVG icons, which look good at any size.

With the great possibility of zoom with CTRL + "+" in the new Firefox 3, all the image are zoomed proportionally with the text.

If these images were SVG's, the quality of the scaling will be increased very much ! It alreday works with the Gnome Bar, the icons are enlarge proportionally with the width of the Bar.

This will be very helpful when surfing in 120% mode.

Thanks !

I am using Kde 4.1 on my computer, while overall it looks better than 4.0, I have several complaints. First of all, can Kubuntu make its own KDE 4 Start menu icon? I mean how long would that take, two seconds? Second of all, can Kubuntu also make icons for the shut down , logout, restart, hibernate, etc.? Because right now all of the icons are the same when in 4.0 they were different. I used to have lock screen/logout widget, but since the icons are the same ugly kubuntu computer widget, I can't tell them apart. Furthermore, I wish it was more obvious how to move the plasma widgets in 4.1, but I suppose this is just a learning curve.

At this current stage, Ubuntu, and more precisely Gnome, lack some basic customizing features like: advanced options for screen savers, being able to change font colours, assign different wallpapers for different virtual screens, use more than one chrome ( colour ) for the panels and other basic settings that are taken for granted in other OS's.

I know that Gnome isn't aiming to become as option intensive as KDE, but these features together with an option in the "Theme" selector to revert back to the original default theme would make life easier for all users a like to tweak their desktops to be more personal.

A lot of polish needed during shutdown / log out.

Very likely event during ubuntu usage:
- You click the button in the top of the screen. Then you do restart/power off/log out. But one of your apps has a document open.

What should happen:
- The app creates a notify dialog, the app's taskbar button appears in the taskbar and begins to flash, you click the button, the application goes visible and you can click "No, I don't want to save the file that's the reason I pressed power off without handling this file first", shutdown continues.

What happens now:

- After the app creates the dialog,

Problem A:
The app's button flashes. You try to click the button, but it doesn't respond. gnome-panel has gotten unresponsive after you started the shutdown procedure. You need to guess that ALT+TAB is your only way to exit. If you do nothing, it will never shut down and gnome-panel will remain unresponsive, which will probably make your life harder.

Problem B.
The app is in another desktop. So, this time the button does not even appear in the taskbar. Good luck finding out you got an app in another desktop blocking the shutdown process . If you find out, you cannot switch to the other desktop, because... gnome-panel doesn't respond anymore. My solution to this is CTROL+ALT+BACKSPACE, I wish a new user good luck finding that out.

Conclusions:
- gnome-panel should be the last app to die during a shutdown sequence, it should wait for all other apps to be closedm then quit. It should also stay responsive. I think the gnome panel currently waits for all applications to be closed, but it doesn't allow another thread to take care of clicks passed to the panel, this is bad.

[....]

I often have to copy folders somewhere and many times need to see how big certain folders are. Can they fit on my usb-stick? Which folder had the large size foto's in it? Which folder causes the heave use of storage? and more questions can easily be answered by this..

This should obviously be an optional collum when having detailed view in Nautilus as well.

I now always have to right click and select properties which is quite annoying if you need to check many folders..