Contributor jmmL

Often after doing an update the double arrow icon will appear indicating a need to reboot. But if you click it, no reason is given as to why reboot is needed.

My idea is that clicking on the icon (or a "Why?" link for more information) should indicate why the OS thinks a reboot is needed so I can make a decision about whether to do it now or later.

my other ideas

Finally Wine 1.0 has been released after 15 years or development.

http://www.winehq.org/?announce=1.0

Please update the repository to 1.0, there has been lots of work to make sure its stable.

I think some of the screenshots on www.ubuntu.com are outdated.

For example, the menu screenshot on this page: http://www.ubuntu.com/products/whatisubuntu is not the menu we see in 8.04.

Also, some text is outdated as well. For example, this page: http://www.ubuntu.com/products/WhatIsUbuntu/kubuntu says "KDE version 3.5.5 is the current stable release".

There are lots of other examples on the website. I think to use up-to-date screenshots is very important. They would give new users a better and more accurate impression of Ubuntu compared with old screenshots.

Personal configuration in the first session.

Example 1:
Do you have Wi-Fi or Blutooth?
If don't use it, the system or script will be remove configuration to Grub or in the session initial make boot more fast.

Example 2:
Do you have HP printing?

Others configuration:
Splash Screen; PC or Lap Top; Questions about boot; initial programs that will be running in start; update System, configure ubuntu drives and codecs restrict, and many other configuration.

It wold be access in the Sistem/Administration when is will be necessary.

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.

Hard Disk (partitions) should have better names (labels). For example, I have three 120GB Hard Disks, and Labels are "120.0 GB Media" for all 3 disk. It would be better "sda1", "sdb1", "sdc1"...

Also, because of labels, it's confusing to manually mount and unmount.

Example of label mismatch:

120.0 GB Media --> Label on Desktop
disk-1 --> Label in /media/
sda1 --> Record in /etc/fstab

Thank you & sorry on bad English

The Ubuntu startup and shutdown splashscreens with the Ubuntu logo and a progress bar underneath it really looks like something from the 90ies (Windows 95 anyone?)

I don't know if there are any hindrances to using images or animations of higher resolutions than what is currently used (for machines that supports it), but I really think Ubuntu can do better here.

This may be an unimportant improvement compared to many other ideas here, but it should be a very quick and easy fix, and it will really help when you try to convince regular folks to make the switch (a graphically stunning desktop is _so_ important when you show it to occasional users!).

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

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!

Now when you use the Human theme, you're stuck with brown.

You should be able to pick a color of your own likening so that you can choose blue, green, yellow, white, orange, black, gray, purple, teal, pink or whatever you like.

Check this awesome artwork that I made!
* http://img519.imageshack.us/img519/317/coloredthemeyz9.png
* http://img229.imageshack.us/img229/7682/colortheme2ls1.png
* Steel
* Rainbow


From idea #9139 (merged):

Currently the theming is all over the place and changing one place does not affect any other. Although that kind of tweakability is great, most users just want different default colors. (pink, blue, brown, black)

What we should be having:
A: wallpaper - changes every release
B: color-theme - human (easily configurable by user!)
C: splash-canvas - human (we need to create this)
D: gtk-engine - clearlooks with B as default colors
E: kde-engine - oxygen with B as default colors
F: icon-theme - tango with color-filter using B

From these we could generate:

[....]

I know it's not really the issue of CANNONICAL or ubuntu, but still.
I'm using kubuntu, but i save all of my files in doc, because
odt isn't supported everywhere, i listen music in wma format
(don't really know why not rather in mp3) because no mp3 palyer or anything like that supports ogg format. I have to write my seminar work in times new roman, because my faculty demands that all the documents to be written in this font.
The idea of free software is lost when the society demands that you use non-free formats...
-----------------------------------
Edited: 13.5.2008:
I forgot to add idea hoe to promote that...
Well as you see I contemplated for a long time and this is what I came up:
As said in the comments sign on going or start a new on-line petition.
Lobby (with whole open source community) at your government to switch from proprietary software to open / free software.
I remember that i once read that Linux is national OS in Chine and some other countries.
Demand that your university adds TNR similar open font as their "demanded font".
And all of us that are citizens of European Union should lobby that EU demands from "mp3" producers to produce mp3 players with free formats support. Also we could even demand that computers shouldn't be sold with preinstalled OS
(usually Windows), so that user can choose to buy or self install OS that they prefer.
(I think the EU could do all of this, because it already made Microsoft to exclude media player from windows and also the whole office suite...)
Hope this gives some idea what you can do to promote free formats

When I login to a GNOME session, the windows appear glitchy and fragmented until the desktop is done loading. When i login to a KDE(4) Session, I see a very nice splash screen, which then fades out to a fully loaded desktop. A default GNOME installation should support complete loading of the desktop before it is displayed.

Gnome-panel drops behind other desktops in the look and feel of the panel.

There are loads of Ideas e.g. on gnome-look.org about improving the panel and especially the menu. It looks like a lot of people don't like the situation right now.

It would be nice to have some discussion, how gnome-panel could be improved.

Please notice, this is not about changing the panel into a dock, but about extending its funktionallity and look and feel while keeping what we already have, and works well.

Ubuntu has this wonderful UbuFox integration that prompts you to install missing plugins via the package manager when you visit a webpage that requires Flash.

But YouTube (and some other sites) will tell you you're missing Flash and then link you to the Adobe Flash download webpage, which has a .tar.gz and an .rpm but no .deb download.

Since we already have .deb files for flashplugin-nonfree in the repositories, would it be difficult for Ubuntu/Canonical to convince Adobe to host it alongside the other download options?

TrueCrypt is a high standard secure method of storing data supporting many high level encryption levels. http://www.truecrypt.org/screenshots.php
It should be implemented as encrypting an entire partition is not very practical these days. Only some data are important and the others are just data. I use TrueCrypt and it is extremely fast though it encrypts files on the fly. No latency what so ever.

This is an attempt at a unification of:

http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/idea/7081/
http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/idea/7390/
http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/idea/7649/
http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/idea/7725/

I can't think, nor have I heard, of any showstopper reason for why BitTorrent shouldn't be used as the primary download method of Ubuntu respository packages. Although the specifics of the implementation of this idea will be different for ISOs and repositories, I feel they should be unified in the brainstorm because the goal is to allow the rapid, efficient, reliable, and available download of Ubuntu software.

Implementation Benefits

1) Speed. All Ubuntu downloads (ISO downloads, dist upgrades, regular system updates, and new application installs) will as a whole be faster. Generally torrent download speeds benefit from higher numbers of downloaders that seed, which Ubuntu users have demonstrated they are prone to do. BitTorrent is better able to absorb (and eventually use as an asset) large numbers of users attempting to download data at the same time, such as with the recent mad rush of Hardy downloaders/upgraders.

2) Efficiency. The BitTorrent protocol has proven to be one of the most efficient methods of distributing data amongst a large number of clients. It will harness the collective upstream of tens of thousands of Ubuntu users, from DSL and cable connections to the fastest of corporate connections.

3) Reliability. Checksums guarantee the integrity of BitTorrent downloads, so data corruption is much less likely to occur. Only the pieces that fail checksum are redownloaded, contributing to points 1 and 2.


[....]

Place bookmark for this brainstorm site in Firefox bookmark folder "Ubuntu and Free Software links". This will bring more people and more ideas.

Currently (Hardy Heron) if the user tries to eject a CD which is locked by a process, a pop-up appears saying:

Cannot unmount volume

An application is preventing the volume 'CDROM Volume' from being unmounted.

Sometimes it may be obvious what to do to get your CD back. Close down an app, or whatever. Sometimes there will be no visible application windows, and no way for an average user to get the disk out short of rebooting.

I propose adding a list of locking processes to the pop-up, with an option to close them and eject the disc.

CONS: Users might kill something they didn't mean to.

PROS: The user has complete control, as it should be.

It's great Memtest86+ comes with Ubuntu. It may help people who get problems with the LiveCD, and instead of saying Ubuntu sucks, this tool shows that they hardware is damaged.

However, the version of Memtest86+ used is quite old. The newest 2.01 supports the latest hardware and I see no reason why it should'nt be updated.

Please bring latest Memtest86+ with Intrepid Ibex!

Debian allows to download and install everything , i mean the whole os from Internet no need to burn iso to cd/dvd ,but ubuntu doesnt have such feature have a look at this website .

http://goodbye-microsoft.com/