Contributor corenominal

I think, a lot of people like to help with ubuntu development, but they don't know where to start. This includes not only programmers but also designers, music composers or just the normal ubuntu user.

So how about creating a website "howcanihelp.ubuntu.com" where everyone (except for C/C++ programmers ;-) ) can find out how to contribute?

Examples:
PHP Programmer -> help with Brainstorm Development, someproject.ubuntu.com needs a new Website, ...
Music Composer -> (don't know where this should link)
Graphic Artist -> https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Artwork
Foreign Language Native Speaker -> Translate Subtitles at screencasts.ubuntu.com,...
Beginner Ubuntu User -> (don't know if we find something for them :-) )
Advanced Ubuntu User -> Help people at IRC #ubuntu, https://help.ubuntu.com/community/WikiToDo, join the Documentation Team...
Marketing Expert -> ...


and so on!

if we must have screensavers give us some useful ones. Educational and Informational.

-- Clock and Weather Screensaver.
-- Alarm Clock and Weather Screensaver.
-- World Clock Screensaver.
-- Local Weather with Weather Around the World Screensaver.
-- Count Down to Specific Date Screensaver.
-- World Atlas Map (Countries and Bodies of Water) Screensaver.
-- Human Body (Muscles and Bones) Screensaver.
-- System and Network Status Screensaver.
-- User Photos Slideshow Screensaver.
-- Panoramic view of landscapes screensaver.
-- Destination Photos from Around the World Sceensaver.
-- Icon which shows up when new Mail or Instant Message Arrives.
-- RSS Screensaver.
---- World News screensaver.
---- Word of the day screensaver.
---- Today in History screensaver.
---- Nutritional Health Tip Screensaver.
---- Screensaver with Collection of Jokes.
---- Various Dictionary Screensavers (Programming Terms, Linux, Mathematics, Science, Legal, Tech...)

While requesting features to the open source community which consist mainly of free workers, we may often forget to say how much we like Ubuntu and look like costumers requesting.

So you can say thank you to the thousands of developers and users who gave their time by voting for this article :)

Unlike Epiphnay, Firefox is not a real GNOME application, even with the enhanced native look which has been introduced by Firefox 3.0.

Epiphany is a very simple browser, more conforming to the spirit of GNOME, which lacks a lot of the features of Firefox. However, I think most people will probably not need Firefox' extra features and plugins. Those who do need Firefox could easily download it when Epiphany becomes the default webbrowser included out-of-the-box in Ubuntu. Ubuntu should aim for consistency, and Epiphany certainly is a better candidate than Firefox if consistency is the goal.

Epiphany currently uses the Gecko-engine for rendering, but will probably feature WebKit - http://live.gnome.org/Epiphany/WebKit - soon. WebKit would probably do a better job than Gecko.

Because somehow Ubuntu brainstorm says the Blueprint URL I gave isn't valid, I give it here in the text: https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+spec/epiphany-default-browser

As I understand it, many users have multiple systems on which they run Ubuntu. Due to the nature of Ubuntu/Linux and the way in which it is easily customisable, I think it would be a good idea to create a GUI application to easily remaster Ubuntu with user specific customisations.

An easy to use application designed to achieve this would save users, like myself, from having to customise each installation individually. The customisations could be made once, burned to disc and then installed on any number of machines. This would save users a huge amount of time and could also benefit organisations wanting to install their own customised version of Ubuntu.

Note: scripts [such as remastersys] already exist and they will help to achieve this; however, they can be quite buggy and require the user to have a good understanding of the scripting language and the inner working of Ubuntu. I wouldn't consider them very user friendly.

Ubuntu's bootloader is a stark black and white screen, filled with confusing options. It gives newbies a moment of indecision, as they try to figure out if they are supposed to choose something, and wonder why there are three or four Ubuntus listed. Then the timer finishes counting down (starting from 10), and the newb begins to feel like he's getting in over his head as his PC boots into Ubuntu.

Too much information up front, stark text-only display, painfully long countdown timer. What would be the alternative? Well, when a Fedora PC is booted up, the first thing the user sees is a graphical splash screen, and "Booting into Fedora (kernel version) in 4 seconds ... " The user can press a key to interrupt and select from kernel versions or alternative operating systems, or just let it boot into Fedora.

Can't we create our own attractive bootloader? Or, failing that, copy-and-paste Fedora's?

At the moment it's possible to manage traditional wired and WiFi connections using Network Manager. To connect via a modem, a 3G/GPRS card, over bluetooth to a cell phone or via USB to another device requires that the user installs extra packages, and does a fair amount of configuration that isn't found in Network Manager.

A single unified tool should be provided which allows the user to connect to a network (or internet) via any supported method. It would also be useful to provide an extension to this tool to manage firewall rules and network connection sharing.