I was really happy when that Ask HN thread was first posted and even happier now knowing that all of the comments were read and thoroughly considered. That said, what this blog post and the general feeling I get from Ubuntu as a whole is that:
1. There is too much of a focus on how far Ubuntu has come and not enough focus on how far things still need to progress. I too remember the days when sleep/hibernate were a crap shot, but that was when I viewed Ubuntu as an open source alternative without much expectation. Nowadays, I see Ubuntu as a mature desktop and as such, I judge it much more harshly. Anything that doesn't work or isn't 99.99% stable is a red flag for me. So I do hope that the Ubuntu team puts more focus on making things up to date, rock solid, and super stable rather than go chase after new features. Just like a building, you need a stable foundation before building upwards.
2. There isn't a clear target audience for Ubuntu Desktop. What does Ubuntu Desktop want to be? Before it was convergence and while a very neat idea, I was never clear on who was supposed to use it. The requirements screamed high income, tech savvy end users. However, development focused on Unity, Mir, etc. with work going into features that didn't fit the target audience. For example, like the post says, HiDPI & 4K were a surprise. Why was this surprising? The group that would most likely be your early adopters and trend setters are the same exact group that would have this type of hardware. Same with trackpad, gestures, customizability, flux, root on ZFS, security, etc. All of those are used heavily by the demographic most likely to follow the news on Unity and convergence. It baffles my mind that Ubuntu's Product Management couldn't make this connection and understand what core features to build out first in Unity/Mir. Yes, these are on the sidelines now, but I really hope the Product Management team takes the time to figure out some direction.
3. At the moment, Ubuntu is at a major crossroad. Even after Mark Shuttleworth's post, this post, and all of my usual Linux news following, I don't really know where Ubuntu Desktop is going to go. Tell us what we can expect as users. Tell us when we can expect it to come. Tell us how you intend on getting there. And most importantly, tell us how we can help! Either though regular posts to various communities like the Ask HN one, or ways we can contribute actual work. Not everyone is a dev, but as an example, I used to do professional QA and yet I found it extremely difficult to find out how I can help QA things and submit useful bug reports (this isn't just Ubuntu but most open source projects). The usual "check the docs/wiki" or "submit something on the issue tracker" are not helpful. In all of my years using Linux, that Ask HN thread + this blog post was the first time I ever felt like I was heard and managed to contribute to Ubuntu. Even something as simple as periodically getting feedback from the community and telling us what you heard from us makes me feel more optimistic about Ubuntu's future.
I apologize for the rant-like nature of my comment, but hopefully this gets read and something positive comes out of it. Thanks for reading.
> Anything that doesn't work or isn't 99.99% stable is a red flag for me. So I do hope that the Ubuntu team puts more focus on making things up to date, rock solid, and super stable rather than go chase after new features. Just like a building, you need a stable foundation before building upwards.
I agree. I was surprised that the "More QA, testing, stability, general polish" wasn't higher on the list.
1. There is too much of a focus on how far Ubuntu has come and not enough focus on how far things still need to progress. I too remember the days when sleep/hibernate were a crap shot, but that was when I viewed Ubuntu as an open source alternative without much expectation. Nowadays, I see Ubuntu as a mature desktop and as such, I judge it much more harshly. Anything that doesn't work or isn't 99.99% stable is a red flag for me. So I do hope that the Ubuntu team puts more focus on making things up to date, rock solid, and super stable rather than go chase after new features. Just like a building, you need a stable foundation before building upwards.
2. There isn't a clear target audience for Ubuntu Desktop. What does Ubuntu Desktop want to be? Before it was convergence and while a very neat idea, I was never clear on who was supposed to use it. The requirements screamed high income, tech savvy end users. However, development focused on Unity, Mir, etc. with work going into features that didn't fit the target audience. For example, like the post says, HiDPI & 4K were a surprise. Why was this surprising? The group that would most likely be your early adopters and trend setters are the same exact group that would have this type of hardware. Same with trackpad, gestures, customizability, flux, root on ZFS, security, etc. All of those are used heavily by the demographic most likely to follow the news on Unity and convergence. It baffles my mind that Ubuntu's Product Management couldn't make this connection and understand what core features to build out first in Unity/Mir. Yes, these are on the sidelines now, but I really hope the Product Management team takes the time to figure out some direction.
3. At the moment, Ubuntu is at a major crossroad. Even after Mark Shuttleworth's post, this post, and all of my usual Linux news following, I don't really know where Ubuntu Desktop is going to go. Tell us what we can expect as users. Tell us when we can expect it to come. Tell us how you intend on getting there. And most importantly, tell us how we can help! Either though regular posts to various communities like the Ask HN one, or ways we can contribute actual work. Not everyone is a dev, but as an example, I used to do professional QA and yet I found it extremely difficult to find out how I can help QA things and submit useful bug reports (this isn't just Ubuntu but most open source projects). The usual "check the docs/wiki" or "submit something on the issue tracker" are not helpful. In all of my years using Linux, that Ask HN thread + this blog post was the first time I ever felt like I was heard and managed to contribute to Ubuntu. Even something as simple as periodically getting feedback from the community and telling us what you heard from us makes me feel more optimistic about Ubuntu's future.
I apologize for the rant-like nature of my comment, but hopefully this gets read and something positive comes out of it. Thanks for reading.