Unity and Netbook a Match Made in Heaven
Ubuntu 11.04 came out last week and in addition to all sorts of wonderful changes such as LibreOffice being the default office suite and Banshee replacing Rhythmbox (FINALLY!!!) the biggest change of all is the incorporation of Unity replacing Gnome as the default desktop manager.
Having used Gnome for many years, when I first heard of the change I was slightly skeptical, a bit disappointed, and nervous of what it would be like to not work in a gnome environment. My biggest fear was that Unity would be a copy of the netbook remix desktop manager, which I was never a huge fan of.
I use a netbook most of the time, it is very convenient and since I typically carry three or four books around with me at any given time you just cannot beat the fact that it weighs so little. Having said that, the usability of the desktop manager is very important to me because I do not have much real estate to give up. I was not a huge fan of NBR because it seemed a little clunky, lots of lag, and was not very well polished. I found the default gnome desktop to be much more usable on a netbook so i stuck with it.
After using 11.04 with Unity on my netbook for the past several days, I must say that they were meant for each other. Now, it is important to mention that Unity is not only a part of the “netbook” edition, but it is the default desktop manager system wide, but it is especially useful for the netbook platform.
The following is a short list of reasons why I think Unity and the Netbook were meant to be together.
- Responsive, beautiful, auto-hiding menus that work well with no lag with even the most basic netbook with atom processor and integrated graphics card.
- Applications take up all of the screen! Which is very important when you do not have much screen space to give up.
- New Apple-like search feature makes finding files and applications a flash!
All in all, Ubuntu never lets me down - so I think Unity will be just another improvement on one of the best Linux distros out there today.
On a side note, another very useful and usable netbook distro that comes to a close second to the new Unity is Meego - it is a great system, still in development, but pretty much designed for the netbook from the ground up.
Thank you for reading! Share your thoughts with me on bluesky, mastodon, or via email.
Check out some more stuff to read down below.
Most popular posts this month
- 2024
- Reinstalling Windows at 1am
- SQLite DB Migrations with PRAGMA user_version
- My Custom Miniflux CSS Theme
- How to Disable Wayland in Debian Testing
Recent Favorite Blog Posts
This is a collection of the last 8 posts that I bookmarked.
- Give Your Spouse the Gift of a Couple's Email Domain from mtlynch.io
- Skip the Next iPhone from Articles on Jose M.
- Have smart glasses finally hit an inflection point? from The Torment Nexus
- The McPhee method from the jsomers.net blog
- Pluralistic: LLMs are slot-machines (16 Aug 2025) from Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow
- Pluralistic: Bluesky creates the world's weirdest, hardest-to-understand binding arbitration clause (15 Aug 2025) from Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow
- Just a Little More Context Bro, I Promise, and It’ll Fix Everything from Jim Nielsen’s Blog
- The Futzing Fraction from Deciphering Glyph
Articles from blogs I follow around the net
Futureverse announces restructuring two years after raising $54 million
In 2023, there was no shortage of buzzy press coverage for Futureverse, which promised to build a metaverse and gaming-focused blockchain. They partnered with Ready Player One author Ernest Cline to build the "Readyverse". Th…
via Web3 is Going Just Great September 30, 2025New site, kinda
If you’re reading this blog using RSS or via email (when I remember to send the content via email), you likely didn’t notice it. And if you’re reading my blog in the browser but are not a sharp observer, chances are, you also didn’t notice it. A n…
via Manuel Moreale — Everything Feed September 30, 2025Pluralistic: Announcing the Enshittification tour (30 Sep 2025)
Today's links Announcing the Enshittification tour: Come say hi, why dontcha? Hey look at this: Delights to delectate. Object permanence: HP defeat device; It Gets Better; OPM hack endangers CIA in Beijing; Self-driving cars crash. Upcoming appearance…
via Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow September 30, 2025Generated by openring