Contributor some_random_noob

Why having two places to look for software?
Put them together under Add/Remove Programs.

As another user said on his idea: "synaptic (wft is that anyway?)".

Thanks for your hard work!

I recently had Gutsy 7.10 installed. No Sound. Could not open a PDF file. Could not open a complex Word file using Open Office. All I got was an error code. Went to Google apps and still got an error code with PDF and Word until I tried using a HTML feature and it worked in Google. The beauty of the Brainstorm site for a Newbie is to see why there might be such problems. There is no better 'heads up' than Brainstorm for a Newbie who is wondering WHY. I know about going to the forums to find a solution or why there may not be one. Anyway, I like what I see in Brainstorm and it gives a Newbie a concrete landscape of challenges instead of mysteries. Hats off to those that suggested this idea. I very much appreciate this site and, please, keep it coming for those of us learning the ropes. Many thanks.

Amsn is better, it looks good and everybody that a know use it. In my opinion amsn must replace pidgin as a default Instant Messaging client

MC is easier to use for novice users than vi or pico/nano if during the installation process the user is strands in textmode. MC is a powerful editor and filemanager that is still easy to use.

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

So many people have Windows programs as the only thing keeping them from making a full transition from Windows to Linux. Perhaps it would be possible to make WINE a part of the Ubuntu install, so newbies could still use many of their Windows programs? Perhaps the first time they click on an EXE a window would pop up, saying that it'll run in WINE and may not work (as WINE is not quite perfect - yet anyways).

The standard linux filesystem starts with / as opposed to c:\.

To encourage windows users, there be a way to spoof the look of a windows style filesystem. The idea is to alias root as C:\ and mounted drives under other letters,and show reverse slashes throughout the filesystem. To a windows user, the / root is intimidating, and the "reversed" (from their perspective) slashes are a different look and a strange feel to adapt to. This change is a good opportunity to make users feel at-home.

Have an option in appearance for xp-vista like look i.e. start menu, blue or black glass look, one bar, quick launch, notify area, and a control panel.

Tightly integrate, mail client, blog writer, feed reader, and calender into one application that is not too memory intensive. Something like having thunderbird by default write blogs, and have a two way sync with services like google calendar. Or maybe evolution but that is a heavy application that requires a lot of memory and i don't use it for that reason.

Today most of the computers are providing 2Go of RAM or more. When I'm looking at the memory consumption of ubuntu it is about 400Mo.

I think that Ubuntu should look at the RAM capacity of the computer and take the full advantage of the hudge amount of memory that we have today.

I'm sure it will be possible to preload most usefull apps and to bring a more efficient, smooth and fast system.

Would be better if Live Cd and Alternate Install disk, was only one disk..