New Years Operating System resolutions

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New years is a week away. Traditionally people make resolutions for how they are going to change, but this year I want to do things differently.

Make some bold statements on how your favourite operating system should improve in the next year(or more). I don't want to see anyone ragging on operating systems they don't like. That is not productive, that is not cool. Its tangentially about self improvement. About making your environment friendlier or more useful to other people.

Maybe some of you are using legacy systems. In that case its fair for you to make hopeful wishes that the current crop of operating systems restores some feature that you like.

Its a game of devils advocate. Critique your favorite OS.

I'll start.

UBUNTU

Ubuntu needs to broaden its appeal.

That means plugging all the holes requiring the use of the command line interface. I think they are on the way to this, but... Hurry up! I like the CLI, but its unreasonable to expect everyone to use it.

This also means getting some market viable software developed. I doubt you'll ever see things like Microsoft office run natively, but perhaps Mark Shuttleworth needs to financially encourage some publishers to provide binaries for their product.

Canonical also needs to overcome the preconception that you cannot get started with Ubuntu without technical knowledge.

LINUX

The Linux community as a whole needs to work out a way to make non open source software(such as games) cross platform. Without this, large publishers will never sell even digital copies of their software to the Linux community. This will also prevent monolithic support for certain distros(such as Ubuntu). If apple can do this with the switch over to OSX, so can Linux.



I'll cut it short here. There is lots more to be said, but I don't want to say it all. Someone else can chip in.

Tear em up, keyboard cowboys.

I've done plenty of tests of linux variants over the years but I've only just started serious use of Ubuntu on a laptop that has gotten a bit too slow for the bloated SP2 of XP.

The two things I'd want from Ubuntu are

1. A Proper installation "wizard thingy" which you can start, then ask to look at a file or CD and have it work out the rest. No more having to go to command lines etc... It should be able to say... "oh... this is a Windows App... I'll need to set it up to run with WINE" or "oh... this is a linux app, I'll create the icon for it".

It would be good if it could be sensible about where apps got stored too - and perhaps do a check via a specific URL for updates, additional instructions, patches etc.


2. Simple Wireless Connectivity. My laptop is using the wired connection because the wireless PCMCIA card I had in it doesn't seem to work with Ubuntu... Of course, that might simply be my poor Ubuntu skills.

UBUNTU
needs a better WLAN protocol that will communicate with the router more than once an hour, I had to run a cable through my basement to get internet in Ubuntu.

Windows 2000 - I want eternal support... stuff like drivers, etc. It's rock solid, stable, and still does 99% of what I want...actually, I wish I could have an emulation mode to run some Paleolithic games I still play (Duke Nukem 3d, Quake 2, etc... without getting a serious case of the 'jerkies'...

Windows, needs to get rid of UAC & fix driver issues with certain printers & scanners.

UBUNTU: Needs to include a better theme and more eye candy by default. The default Ubuntu look is pretty lame, and contributes to a sense that it's a "cheap" OS.

They've been moving in this direction already, but more proprietary drivers and plugins need to be available easier. Not all of us obsess as much about Free Software as Stallman does, and we need our computers to work.

I want a better office suite! OpenOffice (OK, it's Sun and not Canonical, but OOo is the de facto standard in Linux) needs to be more feature-rich and include all the other fancy bells and whistles that MS Office has. Of course, I currently have 3 installs of Office 2007 on my computer (one in Vista and one in each XP) and still never use it.

They need to do a better job of promoting themselves to the general public. I've found that, when someone is having Vista problem, they will often welcome a new Ubuntu install so they can do what they need to, no hassle. Emphasize this ease of use.

Provide some little configuration wizards during the installation process to allow more control over what all goes on your system. I'd like to cut a few things off to get even better performance, and I don't feel like becoming a kernel hacker in order to do so.

Mac OSX: Bring back Darwin binaries! I'd want to play with that.

Offer different themes like every other OS in the world. Not everyone likes Aqua, and I'm among those who don't.

Bring some more support to the open-source Macports, Darwnports, and Fink projects.

Make it easier to install alternate desktop environments (I want GNOME on my Mac!) perhaps even offer it as an option during installation of the OS.

This goes along with the current DE: fix window management. It currently sucks ass. Exposé is neat, but they only need it because they've failed to integrate a tabbed window list at the bottom of the screen like everyone else.

Allow users to cut it down some during installation. It's more bloated than it needs to be.

UBUNTU:
1. Needs more drivers so it works "out of the box" without frustrating Ubuntu virgins without having to delve into the guts of the operating system compiling downloaded source code and spending hours on forums trying to get it working properly with existing hardware. (This is the main reason I've twice abandoned Ubuntu).

Vista:
1. Needs more functionality putting back in that was dropped in the migration from XP.

2. Needs much better and deeper technical help information.

3. Needs to be provided with a very large sheet of bubble wrap which can popped to relieve Vista stress.

My only New Years resolution is to wipe my entire XP Pro/Ubuntu setup and install a Vista Ultimate/Arch Linux or any distro besides Ubuntu that has Gnome as the default desktop environment.

Basically the same list as I had about 5 months ago - mainly Linux dstros

I kinda like vista. I would like to see if microsoft does any GOOD updates to it and IE7 for better security.

I got the auto updates for the 64bit IE7, but I think the fix is IE8 ... IE6 is better I think, visually. IE7 has little to it.

Is there something wrong with Ubuntu, or are you just looking for a new adventure?

XP Pro>>Vista Ultimate. I should know, I have both of them installed on my computer. If you really want Vista, more power to you, but I really think XP is, for almost any purpose, the better option by far.

to my XP at work: get OSX Spotlight, please
(and no, WDS 4 is no Spotlight)

I want Spotlight to work in OS X. It doesn't work that well to me.
Also, the finder needs to remember my window settings. It gets annoying.

what don't you like about Spotlight?

If you're in the Finder, and search for something, it should automatically assume you mean inside the folder you're searching.
Sometimes I will type in "calculator" or "firefox" and it won't find the application. It needs to be more reliable.