But where's page 2 of the article? :P
Do you use Windows not because you like it or there’s some specific Windows-only application that you must use but because it’s what came on your PC? If that’s you, Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu, wants you to try their soon to be out Ubuntu 11.04 Linux desktop.
When I talked with Canonical marketing manager Gerry Carr, I hadn’t expected him to say that. Over the last few years, Linux desktop vendors haven’t really tried to take on Windows head-on. Oh, to be certain, I think the Linux desktop is great. I’m writing this story on Mint 10, an Ubuntu variant, and I use openSUSE 11.4, Fedora 14, and MEPIS 8.0 on other PCs and laptops. But, I know most people are content to use Windows because that’s what comes on their PCs. Carr thinks though that with Ubuntu 11.04’s new desktop interface and a few other tricks up Canonical’s sleeve, Ubuntu can win over “casual Windows users.”
Carr told me that Canonical has been working on “transforming Ubuntu to bring it to mainstream market. Yes, it has better security; yes it’s open source; but Ubuntu, and other desktop Linux distributions, lacked real reasons to switch for Windows users who don’t think about operating systems. We needed to develop a better choice for default Windows users. We need to break them out the jail of habitual Windows use.” Canonical’s way to do that is with Unity.
Besides just having an interface that doesn’t look like either most versions of Windows or Linux, Unity is meant to work in a different manner. For example, Carr notes that while you can use folders and files to organize your files, you don’t have to. “Search has become essential to how we organize Ubuntu. You no longer have to remember where you put files. Unity will take care of finding them for you.”
Another change is in how you work with active applications. With Unity’s indicators, application icon controls that enable you to see what’s what with your active programs and enable you to work with them, you can use an application’s functionality without needing to minimize one program and maximize the other. So, for example, “if you’re playing music using Ubuntu’s media-player Banshee you can use the volume control indicator to select tracks to play rather than going to Banshee, The communications indicator gives you access to all your instant messages and e-mail in the same way.
