I had a friend try to grind my gears over the weekend. If you’re such a fan of Ubuntu, why are you carrying around a Macintosh computer? It’s a valid observation but the reality is that I have both a Mac and a PC (Sony Vaio) and it’s the Vaio that’s running Ubuntu. At the time of purchase, buying a big hard drive for the Macintosh was too cost prohibitive. Not so with the Vaio and it was the perfect machine to partition and boot into Ubuntu as well as the Windows 7 that it came with. Due to its size, I view it more as a desktop replacement than a portable unit. But, if I have my rolly computer bag, you know it’s in there.
The Ubuntu side has always been considerably quicker than Windows. When you spend most of your connected time in a browser, speed and ease is appreciated and you can’t beat it with Ubuntu. Ironically, it was over the weekend as well that I decided to upgrade Ubuntu to 13.04, Raring Ringtail. I didn’t really have time to explore at the time – I did the installation and then just starting using it.
It was only when I thought about it that I was surprised that there wasn’t any big exciting change in the release. It wasn’t like there was a new and refined Dash or anything. It was just working. But, as I think about it, it’s working pretty well. Everything was functional but noticeably faster. I wondered – is there something I’m missing? I ran across this article “Press Reaction to Ubuntu 13.04 Is a Muted, “Meh” Affair“. Surely, there must be more.
My next read took me to this article. “Get More Out of Ubuntu 13.04 With These Awesome Apps” and this “10 Things to Do After Installing Ubuntu 13.04“. I’ll be honest, many of the recommendations were already in place but “Geary Mail” was a nice new find. Quite frankly, many of the things that I do, I do in the browser. If it’s not in the browser, it might be LibreOffice, VLC, or Gimp that’s my go-to application. And, of course, they’re already there. There was, of course, the ability to manipulate the various search lenses in the Dash. That’s always fun but not necessarily a life and death change.
What is kind of neat is social integration right in the Dash. No need to flip to a new tab to see what’s up. I really like the concept of the lens and there’s so much to choose from.
I’ve got to be missing something. So, I watched a video.
I guess I wasn’t missing too much. This release is just a snappier, nicer experience. So far, on this end, it seems to be pretty solid. It’s definitely more responsive. I always found it a better actor than Windows 7 on this machine. With the new release, it’s even more noticeable. I’m a really happy user.
Related articles
- How to Upgrade Ubuntu 12.10 to Ubuntu 13.04 (news.softpedia.com)
- To Do List After installing Ubuntu 13.04 aka Raring Ringtail OS (srikanthphp.wordpress.com)
- Ubuntu 13.04 released and my thoughts (Ruchirablog.com)
- Ubuntu 13.04 Released, Download Now Live (omgubuntu.co.uk)
- Ubuntu 13.04 Screenshot Tour Preview (news.softpedia.com)
- Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail is here at last (chedean.wordpress.com)
- How to Test Ubuntu 13.04 without Downloading It (news.softpedia.com)
- Ubuntu 13.04 Review: Linux for the average Joe or Jane (zdnet.com)
- Ubuntu Studio 13.04 Screenshot Tour (news.softpedia.com)
- Ubuntu 13.04 released: how to upgrade (ghacks.net)
doug --- off the record 