Ubuntu popularity dropping?

I just noticed that Ubuntu was not the number 1 on the rank of Distrowatch for the first time (if you look at the last 7 days statistics, Linux Mint is there now). I've read a lot of negative reactions about Ubuntu 11.04 and that people are moving to other distro's (like Linux Mint). Google Trends is also showing a declining trend for Ubuntu while on the other hand Linux mint is growing rapidly in popularity. Am I the only one seeing these changes, or is the Linux "landscape" really changing very fast.

 

I feel they really blew it with 11.04. It is beta quality at best. If 11.10 isn't amazing they are in for a major loss of users.

 

Yep, agreed. I think they really screwed up with 11.04. It's pretty much junk.

 

The main problem was a conflict between the shipped kernel and the Broadcom wireless driver that froze up the desktop. Upgrading the kernel fixed the issue and 11.04 with all the updates is rock solid.

 

I hear a lot of people complain about the UI. I personally love it. 11.04 is the first linux distro to make me wish I could make the change.

 

I don't as much hate the UI as much as the overall build quality. Something crashes on startup and the theme reverts to something very basic. This is repeatable on every installation I have tried. Including upgrading over a 10.10 installation that worked fine before the upgrade. It also seems to have an issue repainting the top toolbar.

If it were more solid I might actually consider dual booting it with Windows 7 instead of running it in a virtual machine. On the other hand VirtualBox has come a long way since I last played with it.

 

I like the new Unity, much improved over the last one. That's on my netbook though.

 

I've never had any reason to use a linux distro lol but I do love that UI.

 

I like the Unity UI also, but I do think 11.04 is just way too buggy in general. I think that's what people are complaining about most. Any new UI takes some getting used to, but bugs... they can be a show stopper.

 

I'm just waiting for it to come along far enough that I can ditch Windows and pocket the several hundred dollars a year I spend on software. The expenses of Windows, Office, Security Suites, non free utilities like Sticky Password and WinZip, etc.

The major thing stopping me is being able to run Steam and all of my games. If that ever happens goodbye Windows.

 

20 dollars for windows with student discount. Haven't bought a software product in years. Cloud alternatives + freeware + being a student.

 

Got Windows 7 Pro (x86 and x86-64) for free as a student. That also comes with XP Mode.

 

Canonical tried to create a gui that would bring in the Windows users and they ended up alienating many power Linux users. I use Ubuntu 11.04 but the Gnome Classic version. Why is it that companies think they have their core users in their pocket and take us for granted. Get off your high horse and listen to your users. A fancy Fisher Price gui for the dolts who don't invest 10 minutes into learning about Linux isn't going to accomplish anything!

 

It'll accomplish a lot. If you have to learn how to use an OS the OS has failed. At least as an OS that aims to be personal use and not server use.

 

On the numerous forums I visit, the majority of people are unsatisfied with 11.04, mostly because of Unity. Common complaints include usability issues - complaints about stability and performance have been less, but still significant. Few people have complained about the overall idea of Unity, but even less have been completely satisfied.

I have seen a few people make comments about how it feels like Ubuntu is in perpetual beta, adding new broken stuff, slowly fixing it and then breaking something else.

I currently need a stable/reliable desktop (don't have the time to fiddle and fix) and sadly 11.04 with Unity is far too poor and even with the classic desktop there are other issues (specific to my hardware configurations and usage pattern) which means I need to use something else to be productive.

Cheers, Nick

 

The closest thing to Ubuntu, combined with stability/reliability, is Linux Mint.
Most recent version Mint 11 "Katya" is at RC now but will be released soon. link

Soon as in this month but the Mint team never offer a release date, it's released when they call it finished. (Not as in 'that's the maximum amount of bugs we've been able to squash before the set final release date'.
Mint 11 even skipped Gnome3, for now at least, so you will have to do with reliable/plain Gnome 2.32 when opting for "Katya".

The current stable release is Linux Mint 10, codename "Julia". link

 

It takes a bit tweaking but you won't find more stable than good old debian. It's what I use as my main distro. On production machines an OS must be stable and debian fits that bill the best. Failing that, slackware or one of its derivatives.

 

Ubuntu studio is ditching Unity and Gnome-Shell in favour of XFCE.

https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-studio-users/2011-May/007629.html

 

Given 11.04's foisting a 3D UI on everyone, and given the condition of the Linux graphics stack (especially support for 3D on low-end hardware), I'm not surprised at all that Ubuntu's popularity is dropping. I'm guessing the average Unity experience ranges from "Too slow" to "Why is there nothing on my screen?"

BTW, I expect Gnome to suffer a similar drop in popularity now that version 3 is out... Because in my experience, "users want eyecandy" is a myth. Users don't want eyecandy. They like eyecandy, but they want their desktop to work properly and allow them to be productive without any tweaking or hardware upgrades. 3D desktops violate all of those requirements.

 

People are not aware of Unity 2D. It offers all the functionality of Unity without any of the accelerated bloat.

It runs fine on a netbook with 1 GB of RAM.

 

Well I'm about to force my daughter to upgrade to 11.04, so we shall see.

 

Oh I'm aware of it, the problem is the 3D version is the default.

 

I have found that the broken theme in 11.04 I was complaining about previously can be fixed by enabling multiple cores in VirtualBox. It is still the slowest version in a while. Once I learned that you could enable visual effects in VirtualBox where you could not in VMWare, I have installed 10.04, 10.10, and 11.04. They all seem to be working mostly correctly now, but 10.04 is the fastest and most stable of the bunch. 11.04 is noticeably the slowest. VirtualBox has me using Linux in general a lot more than I have in a couple of years.