Contributor aidave

I am shocked at the Intrepid beta as I saw - what I thought to be - a blatant digression with the wallpaper and the login/logout sounds from Hardy to Intrepid.

I see for the sounds they made the packaging more freedesktop-friendly, but it still doesn't mean I like it.

Hardy
wall: http://staging.altonlabs.com/ubuntu/hardy.png
login: http://staging.altonlabs.com/ubuntu/hardy-login.wav
logout: http://staging.altonlabs.com/ubuntu/hardy-logout.wav

Intrepid
wall: http://staging.altonlabs.com/ubuntu/intrepid.png
login: http://staging.altonlabs.com/ubuntu/intrepid-login.ogg
logout: http://staging.altonlabs.com/ubuntu/intrepid-logout.ogg

(Feel free to use the links (temporarily) for your blogs. For the wallpapers, see ubuntu-wallpapers or /usr/share/wallapapers. For the sounds, see ubuntu-sounds /usr/share/sounds)

I personally - as a computer nerd - don't care much about the default wallpaper in an operating system as I know it can be changed, but first impressions mean a lot to others. It does mean a lot to me, however, as someone who is in marketing and who has been trained in design for a number of years.

[....]

When you plug in something like a USB dongle, it should be mounted synchronously (-o sync) instead of in buffered mode.

For me, this is far preferable to the minute performance gain gotten by mounting the device in buffered mode. You're very unlikely to be using such devices for anything except data storage/retreival, in which case mounting synchronously is a major benefit. Expecting new users (or those used to Windows XP's behaviour) to know you have to right-click, 'unmount', before removing the drive is not a good idea, as well as just being unnecessary if the device is mounted synchronously. It's also irritating for people like me who know you need to do it, but either occasionally forget or don't want to bother.

Mount the thing synchronously by default. This is what Windows XP does, and it allows you to just remove the drive after any file transfers have finished. Yes, problems will occur if you remove it durung a file transfer, but that's gonna happen in ANY mount mode. It's far more obvious to the user that this will cause a problem than removal of the drive before unmounting. Also stop displaying that 'unsafe device removal' message for devices mounted synchronously.

I guess everybody has experienced the rather long boot up times in Ubuntu (particularly with laptops). I know they are already working on it, but the change from feisty to gutsy was a pain in the ass in terms of boot up speed.
A default WinXP installation beats Ubuntu's boot up time by far!! That shouldn't be allowed fellas!!

I therefore propose to the development team (both Ubuntu and by extension Gnome)to work on the improvement of boot up times in Ubuntu systems.

If possible, could suspend and hibernate be grayed out or hidden on any machine where it does not work?
If this is not possible in an automatic way, then make it a simple configuration option.

This is not a dupe of http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/idea/6909/ that calls for disabling suspend and hibernate all out. I only want it disabled if it doesn't work on the machine in question.

Main reason being that I know of some people who keep accidentally trying to suspend and/or hibernate out of habit from when they used windows, where this did work [bleh]. I'm tired of hearing them complain about it.

There is still no real rival to Microsoft Exchange as a business mail solution, although many stand alone tools exist, they are fragmented as a toolset and fragmented in their implimentation methods.

I'd like to work on an existing tool set (from my research Mozilla Thunderbird and Sunbird appear usable) to bring together functionality to make a usable base mail and calander and contact system that could be packaged into an mail solution for use with ubuntu and other linux distributions potentially.

There are other tools, I suggest these as they exist, have a usable code base and are not tied to a desktop release.

A general outline exists as such

1.) Server Package

An imap server - this is essentially exchange's mail solution, and allows online/offline messages while leaving content on the servers giving multiple clients and web clients the same view of the current mail.

A directory for contacts, ldap seems the obvious choice for this, more so if this is an business product, which would allow desktop general auth, mail auth and provide a contact directoy


A calander service, this needs to exist in the same form as "imap" where updates are made to the server but synced to local clients. I'm not aware of a product capable of this yet, but as sunbird uses sqlite backend, this seems possible at a high level. Used along side ldap auth, this would provide a powerful feature.

2.) a Desktop Package
Deployment of a mail and calander product (thunderbird/sunbird) deployment of ldap client

[....]

Suspend and hibernate still seems to be a big issue based on forum posts. Really focus on fixing it, even with proprietary drivers.

I've got two monitors, and right now if I use the wallpaper settings in gnome it stretches the wallpaper across the two monitors. It does this even for the default ubuntu wallpaper. This can look really bad depending on the image. In order to get around this I had to get two wallpaper images and join them into one large one with the GIMP and set that as my wallpaper.

There should be a way in gnome to set a different wallpaper for each monitor.

==== Merged with ideas of a similar scope: Different wallpapers on different workspace ===

Many workspaces option in Linux allows you to separate your work, why not allow users to have different wallpapers on each workspace. This allows for easier identification of which workspace you are on.
When used with compiz-fusion you can rapidly switch between your workspaces and the different wallapaper will allow you to quickly recognise what desktop you are on.

Currently this is natively available in KDE but not in Gnome. In Gnome you can't even let Compiz take over the wallpaper control because Nautilus doesn't allow for transparent backgrounds.

Other solutions like Wallpapoz are slow and when switching between desktops it takes too long to switch WP.

A lot of people use workspaces for specifics needs: one for internet, another one for coding, a third one for openoffice etc.

But with Gnome, the only way to always open an application on the same workspace is to use tools like DevilSpie witch are not user-friendly.

So why not had a simple "Always open in this workspace" option when you right-click on a application title bar ? (for exemple between "Only on this workspace" and "Move to the left" options)

Ubuntu already has a Desktop and Server edition. Yet what I think would help Ubuntu really succeed in the corporate/government world is an "Enterprise Edition". This would have out-of-the-box support for organizational email, group calendars, and would have less focus on "fun" applications installed (like games and cd extractor).

cheers!

I'm sure there are plenty of duplications, but too many to page through, so here are my list of Rhythmbox additions:
1. Copy Selected Items to Library
2. Don't stop what's playing upon CD/DVD insert
3. Integrate MusicBrainz when new albums are discovered
4. Add Amazon and Google album cover lookup
5. Remove and replace invalid album covers
6. Play with album cover as desktop wallpaper
7. Play video podcasts in visualizer automatically
- IF you can identify a podcast as a Video podcast
8. Receive RSS submissions from Firefox as iTunes does
9. Add the shoutcast directory feature that we lost when Streamcast was discontinued (hey, it's up for grabs!)

Oh and once these features are implemented, dump Sound Juicer.

Right now the user gets the default brown color scheme upon install. I actually like this theme, but I tend to migrate towards a blue theme.

However for a lot of people, changing this is a hassle.

On the install, it would be nice to be able to pick, from a drop down, simply:

- Brown (Default)
- Blue
- Green
- Red
- etc

That will propagate the necessary theme changes.
And then new user accounts will all be like that when created.

If user removed pendrive without unmouting several times warn him about the consequences and give him an option to disable caching for removable drives.

Ubuntu lacks a nice intuitive interface for making programs autostart when the desktop loads.
There is the cryptically named 'Sessions' in
System -> Preferences -> Sessions
but this is a poor choice of names I think. I think it should be called something more intuitive like 'Autostart'

If you do click 'Sessions' you can add programs to autostart, but you must specify their name, path and optional comment yourself. Not very user friendly at all, since the location and exact names of various programs can be hard to know or find for a general user that normally starts the program from the 'Applications' menu.

When you click 'add' there should be a list of all programs that you can see under 'Applications' (but still also possible to specify it manually).

You can view currently running apps, but you should also be able to select one (or many) and click 'Autostart these programs'. That would be a nice touch.

We need more packages in the repository.
To get this, we need to get more package maintainers, make the process easier, and funnier by motivating the package maintainers.

We could give package maintainers motivation by having a highscore list with ranks that they can compete for with each other.
The more packages you contribute the higher level you get which unlocks new ranks. Ranks such as Package Apprentice, Package Conjurer, Arch Packager, Package Master, Package Wizard, Package Lord, and the highly prestigious Lord of the Repository.

Mockup of highscore list with level and ranks

The top contributors could also be rewarded with a special t-shirt, or perhaps to make it cooler a medal or robe.
Imagine the guy wearing the unique prestigious robe of the diligent Lord of the Repository - he will be the envy of everyone, the crowd center around him. He will be the guy every girl wants, and every guy wants to be.

The Lord of the Repository walking among mortals. Look at how they adore him!

I'm bored with dual-screen on GNU/Linux, it really has to have a graphic configuration, and better features.
I would like to move windows from a screen to another, but when I maximize I need it to be in a single screen.

Update: Xrandr GUI blog post by Bryce Harrington

Ubuntu should take full advantage of all available mouse buttons.
Integrate this: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+bug/146160

As there is almost no lightweight IDE for C++ in ubuntu (and for sure anjuta and kdevelop are not good ones!) i suuggest to add code::blocks IDE to ubuntu repositories. The project already distributes ubuntu-specific compiled versions. It also has a 6-month-release period with date-month versioning system. (like ubuntu)