The mighty Karmic Koala, Ubuntu 9.10, is set for release today, the 29th of October.
Seeing what this distribution has to offer, and the changes made in this release, in the next few weeks will be MORE than interesting. (I already use 9.04 as my main OS on one box I have running in the office, which also has Fedora 11, which I like as well)
As a long-time Mac user (and secret lover), I have to say that that is where my initial allegiances lie (and I can get rather nasty about this at times, for which I apologize). Hence my profile name.
Moving on….
With the release of this distribution, I can’t think of many reasons why I shouldn’t put this on my Mac Pro at work to see what I can crank out of her.
I mean, if people seriously (general users) paid more attention to what was going on with Linux distributions, like Ubuntu, Fedora, etc., then they might realize that they could easily switch and be more than comfortable using one of many quality Linux distributions. This also [somewhat] depends on the version of the Window Manager they use. GNOME, even though I used to love KDE back in the “2” days, is a much better interface. KDE 4 has made vast improvements since it’s inception, though.
This Ubuntu release, I think, has the POTENTIAL to switch many people.
If you ask: Do I think that people WILL run to switch to the mighty Karmic Koala?
My answer would be NO.
SHOULD they: YES.
Ubuntu (the desktop version) is as easy an interface as any, including Apple’s OS X (BLASPHEMY!!!!!!). So, why wouldn’t it behoove some of the home users [that want something better (opinion), faster (fact), cheaper (fact), and more stable (fact….OS X aside on the stability….hehe)] to switch?
Like I said earlier: they most likely won’t. But, that being said, this is one OS that, if introduced to the general public in the right manner, could easily convert some [more] Windows users over to a better (opinion) OS.
With the new configuration of their package manager GUI, the Software Center, this could help get people switched over. This could really give Linux a leg up in many homes with users uncomfortable with installing/removing software using a Terminal interface (as most are).
Rumors have it that they are also going to sell software through it, in an iPhone/Apple-esque sort of way….I think.
So, any thoughts on how this might play out for the Koala?