Contributor kazamx

When I came to mounting directories from an XP computer (although any windows this should be applicable) using SAMBA server at startup (similar to "map network drive" in windows) I found that this is relatively cryptic to do, with no warnings or messages to state that the mounting had failed.

Upon googling, I found that this is as for SAMBA to be able to mount using the SMB FS, the mounts need to be added to FSTAB with a lot of UID codes.

ie:

//Server/MountName /MountPoint smbfs credentials=/home/Username/.smbcredentials,uid=Username,gid=users 0 0

For the average user, this seems to be a little haphazard and many will not want to edit FSTAB nor know how to do this

Additionally, the user seems to need to be in the sudoers file.

I propose some sort of SAMBA addon GUI that will allow for automatic updating of FSTAB to this purpose; Perhaps a Nautilus shell script with something similar to the "Map Network Drive..." option in windows, when navigating the Network with Nautilus.

When trying to print a PDF file which has landscape format from kpdf or Adobe Acrobat Reader it doesn't print in landscape. Instead the PDF is printed in portrait format and cropped at the right border of the page. Only xpdf (old program) supports printing in right orientation.
How can we fix this issue?

Right now there isn't really any way for new users to get to know how to use Ubuntu besides asking the same questions that other new users asked before them.
If some tool could be created that gave new users a general walkthrough of how to use and customize their system, this probably wouldn't be much of a problem. It wouldn't even have to be an application; On first boot-up, show tooltips that give little hints. For example, on the panels show one that says something like "Hey! Did you know you can drag these panels to whichever side of your screen you want? You can also add launchers and applets to it, as well as change how it looks, too! Just right-click on one of them to get started"
It actually took me a couple of weeks after I started using Ubuntu to even think of right-clicking on the panels, simply because that didn't allow for anything special in Windows.

Totem should support DVB-IPTV like VLC. I want to watch TV over the Internet. :-)

When I login to my Desktop, the panel is "blinking". :-( I want a clear build-up: First may a nice Splash screen, then the background, than the panel, the Icons, etc. It should be nice feeling. Do you understand me? Please show me a movie of a great ubuntu login without "blinking" and so one.

If I logout, I do not want to see a white text on a black background only for a bit of time. I want to see a nice logut animation. Please show me a movie of a nice logout with ubuntu.

I mean: NO extra startup movie clips on startup, but a clear build-up!

I want an easy GUI for adding desktop widgets like wheather, cpu, notice, pictures, flowers, decorations, animals, chat, mail-alert, diary etc. to my desktop. :D

It would be cool if you could set the screensaver to
"Water Effect".
Instead of having a screensaver pop up, water drops fall
on your desktop or windows.

there should be a far more easier way of changing the splash screen instead of going to the terminal all going through the configuration editor.

In Windows I can just navigate my way to "Program Files" and more than likely find which program I am looking for and a collection of the files this program depends on. I can also use "Add and Remove Programs" to find where they are installed.

I am not recommending to change the standard Linux file system layout, but to add some feature perhaps within the package manager that makes it simple to find out where the package and all of its dependencies are located or "installed to".

First time Linux users can be easily confused by the concept of installing software in Linux. It may be easy to install now, but there is still a layer of confusion when looking for the program that you just installed. Someone may not understand the difference from its Binaries and the actual location of the files that are used to run the application.

It is impossible to delete file from mounted NTFS partition. Files are kept in .[user_name]-Trash folder and cant be deleted from linux system. I need to log into windows and remove trash folder. It's very annoying.

Here in Australia Microsoft allocates a student as a Microsoft representative at every major University and gives them a free Xbox at the end of the year.

We should contact every university's main computing club and allocate a Ubuntu rep (without pay). It would look great on their resume, all CD's and demo materials are sent to them, and some ubuntu gear could be sent to them as thanks. (maybe just a T-shirt or something).

At our uni we had a linux rep, however, he had no focus, and we had no idea what to make of it. Lets get dedicated reps in there, so that the often held linux install days work better.

It would not take any programmers off their duties, and we could simply post a list of universities on the ubuntu frontpage for people to send applications to, if their university hasn't been allocated one yet.

Lets get the word across. Its no good offering to hand out CD's online if people haven't heard of ubuntu, this would give people a chance to tell people why ubuntu

When upgrading the daily alpha updates, I often get into a situation where the new packages don't work. For instance, I may get a kernel upgrade which breaks some driver that I need. Or I get a new bluez-utils package that suddenly doesn't recognize my bluetooth mouse, and I have to move heaven and earth to retrieve the previous version (e.g. bug 191704). My suggestion is that Ubuntu could remember a "last known good" package configuration which you can go back to. Perhaps caching all old config files of upgraded packages is possible as well, to make it all even more reliable, in case an upgrade modifies and breaks a config file.

Currently you don't finde all of the applications which are available in the Ubunut repositories in the Add/Remove dialog. For some of them you have to use either apt-get or synaptic - which both aren't very newbie friendly.

option to only load a media player, like mythtv, vlc, mplayer, miro, songbird, whatever.but only one and as little resource as possible, but still has the mediaplayer.

maybe get firefox modified to be the mediaplayer, similar to songbird, but more developed. then move to a more mature mediaplayer later with browsing capabilility.

Everyone tried to configure his screen with gnome-display-properties in System > Preferences. Everyone know that it don't really work. The implementation of the new displayconfig-gtk is not perfect either. The idea is to build a coherent way to configure screens, (including dual-screen), using a simple GUI.

displayconfig-gtk tools is a good idea, but the changes are not always saved (?) or they erase others Xorg parameters. We should merge gnome-display-properties with displayconfig-gtk, to make the configurations easier.

Please don't install all of them by default.

If the user wants a different one for some reason it can always be installed with Synaptic.

The possibility to restore deleted files with a right mouse click in the trash bin in Gnome

When I first started using Ubuntu, the way I heard about it was several links down in a google search for "linux". This is exemplary of the poor exposure that Ubuntu has. We need to spread public awareness about the operating system, through media outlets, online campaigns, and possible tv/radio/billboard spots.

I think that the best place to start would be online campaigns, especially a series of official videos on youtube and other video sites. These should focus less on technical specs and the benefits of open-source, and more on the benefits of switching from Windows while retaining the ability to preform daily tasks. This will be targeting the main bulk of computer users: Microsoft customers who want to email, type, web browse, and don't like paying for an OS. Other facets of this campaign should include spreading the word about Ubuntu to non-tech oriented, high traffic website (myspace, yahoo), getting Ubuntu back as #1 on distrowatch.com, and creating guides in layman's terms so that non tech-savvy people can understand how to preform simple tasks. For example, don't tell people to open xorg.conf; tell them to type in the terminal 'sudo gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf'.
Doing all of this will require a re-mobilization of the Ubuntu marketing team, several people to design a professional looking marketing video, and structure. Once more momentum is generated, the media will be apt to catch on to the trend. However, we want to make sure at all costs that this is positive exposure. Anything negative (eg. Ubuntu is for geeks only) could immensely hurt our image. Physical advertising is harder to get together, but if someone can find an investor, this could be very possible.
A final idea would be to push for Ubuntu in school systems. I know that where I live, the schools are forced to run Windows 2000 because of slow computers and no funds. Ubuntu could both free funds for education and implant knowledge about the system into children, our future consumer base.
Comment back with any ideas on how to improve this.

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MarketingTeam


edit: We are now #1 on Distrowatch! Also, here is a great example of a promotional video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLHjT5-XM9o

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It is nice idea to create a separate site for speading ubuntu like "spreadfirefox" site. Speadfirefox make greatest job to make firefox so popular. Spread ubuntu will be a cammunity marketing site focussing to spread the word "ubuntu" among all most every corners of the world. It is nice to give prizes like ubuntu hats, stickers and tea shirts among top achievers.

Making groups like LUGS among students and youths in every city and called them ubuntu volunteers or like. The volunteers
spread ubuntu among schools collages and other arias especially among young next generation and understanding them why ubuntu is better than proprietary Operating systems.

The "volunteers of ubuntu" also distribute free ubuntu cds among schools, collages and other people who actually needed it after every new release. They also offer free support or help to install ubuntu among average computer users.

A plugin for compiz able to use on-screen service "Spaces" Mac OS X and all the efects for ubuntu improved and supplemented with compiz-fusion