Ubuntu 8.04 LTS Released

Today, the new Ubuntu version Hardy Heron was released…

and I find myself not really caring.

You see, a little while back, I discovered Arch Linux, a much lighter and faster version of Linux. It takes a little more to install and maintain than Ubuntu, but damn, it’s fast, it doesn’t have tons of stuff running in the background (unless you want it to), and it’s generally much better than Ubuntu for me. Even the package system has a lot of packages to choose from (unlike Slackware, which is why I abandoned it) — not as many as Ubuntu, but close enough.

I’m downloading the new Ubuntu CD right this moment, but I’m wondering if it would really be worth the time and effort to use Ubuntu again? I do still have Ubuntu installed on this machine (the 8.04 beta), but my original plan was to reinstall Ubuntu from the final 8.04 release to see how it goes. I might not be doing that now.

So yeah, I’m considering dropping Ubuntu. I still recommend its use if you’re new to Linux, but for me and anyone else that has a lot of Linux experience, I just think Ubuntu looks less and less attractive now with every release.

An open letter from DoktorSeven to the SC 34 participants in the Oslo plenary, April 2008

I, the undersigned, wish to make it clear that I deplore the methods and means used by Microsoft to push through a wholly broken and closed format through to the DIS 29500 standardization (OOXML). I believe standards should only be carried out when said standard is something that promotes interoperability, openness, and a desire to give something to society as a whole rather than use standardization as a way to strike back at a former approved standard (ODF) so that they can claim standardization on something that is nowhere near a real standard. We are not “strongly disagreeing” with a certain party, only with their manipulative methods used to push through a broken “standard” that is impossible to fully implement due to proprietary metadata information contained within a loosely, incompletely defined so-called “standard”.

I call on everyone that cares about true standardization and interoperability between platforms to support this view, and to continue to attack the ISO “standards” body that has been deceived by Microsoft to support and pass this ill-conceived and broken “standard.”

-Stephen D. Cofer