UNITY, "yes", made a bad appearance before 11.10 in that users were thrown into a brand new menu/bar interface with no alternative choice. Not such a good move. With 11.10, there were a LOT of new "nice" features added. The system still has missing components that one would expect in the distro ... and you still have to "Google" and find the cheat steps to get your CHOICE back so that you can "choose" whether you want to log into UBUNTU with the Unity or the standard menu.

Me? I installed a "dock" utility and got rid of the Unity bar. Now it "hides".
Ubuntu still needs work on the Unity ... but the rest of the OS ... "good job" guys!!